Epic poetry  

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Jupiter and Thetis (1811) by Ingres, Thetis is depicted in the painting by Ingres as pleading at the knees of Zeus: "She sank to the ground beside him, put her left arm round his knees, raised her right hand to touch his chin, and so made her petition to the Royal Son of Cronos" (Iliad, I).
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Jupiter and Thetis (1811) by Ingres, Thetis is depicted in the painting by Ingres as pleading at the knees of Zeus: "She sank to the ground beside him, put her left arm round his knees, raised her right hand to touch his chin, and so made her petition to the Royal Son of Cronos" (Iliad, I).

"Before whom, on her own knees fall’n, the knees of Jupiter Her left hand held, her right his chin, and thus she did prefer Her son’s petition: “Father Jove! If ever I have stood Aidful to thee in word or work, with this imploréd good, Requite my aid, renown my son."--Iliad (8th century BC) by Homer


"It may be questioned whether any of these [mock-heroic] parodies were intended to possess humour; but wherever we find such as have any traces of it, we may conclude that the imitation has been adopted to increase it. This does not necessarily amount to travesty, for the object is not always to throw contempt on the original. Thus, we cannot suppose "The Battle of the Frogs and Mice," or "The Banquet of Matron," although written in imitation of the heroic poetry of Homer, was intended to make "The Iliad" appear ridiculous."--History of English Humour (1878) by Alfred Guy Kingan L'Estrange


“O Frogs! the Mice send threats to you of arms,
And bid me bid ye battle and fix’d fight;
Their eyes all wounded with Psicharpax’ sight
Floating your waters, whom your king hath kill’d,

--Batrachomyomachia by anon.


No Beast is there without glimmer of infinity,
No eye so vile nor abject that brushes not
Against lightning from on high, now tender, now fierce.

--La Légende des siècles by Victor Hugo

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In ancient Greek, 'epic' could refer to all poetry in dactylic hexameter (epea), which included not only Homer but also the wisdom poetry of Hesiod, the utterances of the Delphic oracle, and the strange theological verses attributed to Orpheus. Later tradition, however, has restricted the term 'epic' to heroic epic.

The epic is a broadly defined genre of poetry, which retells in a continuous narrative the life and works of a heroic or mythological person or group of persons. In the West, the Iliad, Odyssey and the Nibelungenlied; and in the East, the Mahabharata, Ramayana, and the Shahnama are often cited as examples of the epic genre.

The genre was parodied in the mock-heroic beginning with the Batrachomyomachia.

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Unless indicated otherwise, the text in this article is either based on Wikipedia article "Epic poetry" or another language Wikipedia page thereof used under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License; or on research by Jahsonic and friends. See Art and Popular Culture's copyright notice.

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