It will always be based around a central heroic figure, contain grandiose speeches and have as its background a hugely important event, take Homer's "Iliad" set against the remarkable backdrop of the Trojan War, for example. ... This is reminiscent of the intervention of Aphrodite in Book V of Homer's "Iliad" to remove her son Aeneas from the battlefield. ... We see them also in their role as followers, Belinda's army, just as an epic hero would have his faithful servants we see how "To fifty chosen sylphs, of special note, / We trust the important charge, the petticoat" ...

• Word Count: 2068
• Approx Pages: 8
• Has Bibliography
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

One of the examples is Iliad, which is extremely important from the European literary standpoint because it constitutes the beginning stages of the development of European literature (Hanczakowski 2001:23). The Iliad, followed by Odyssey are the examples of epic poetry in the early Greek literature, they "emphasized the ideals of honor and bravery and had an enormous influence on Greek culture- (Myrsiades 1997). ... The hero's goal, as Betcher points out in her article The Heroic code in The Iliad, "is to achieve honor", which "is gained through engagement in life-threatening activities...

• Word Count: 2885
• Approx Pages: 12
• Has Bibliography
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

The epic of Gilgamesh, the king of Uruk, and the Iliad, with its focus on the menis of Achilles, provide a look at heroic life and its relationship with death and immortality. ... Enkidu does develop more than Patroclus, and this may mean that he is a more complex character, or it may mean that the background and character of Patroclus was simply well-known in the epic tradition and the necessity to explicitly develop him in the Iliad which is extant did not exist. ...

• Word Count: 4256
• Approx Pages: 17
• Has Bibliography
• Grade Level: Undergraduate