The Epic

An epic is a very long narrated story that is sung or recited as poetry and is passed down many generations in that way.


Three characteristics of an epic are:


1: The main character is larger than life. lines 140-142 "You may be a good man in a fight, Achilles, and look like a god..." He is an amazing warrior and he is half god, half mortal. That seems larger than life to me.


2: The gods play an active roll in the story. Lines 205-228 "Athena came...and grabbed his sandy hair" Athena came down and stopped Achilles from killing Agamemnon, and therefore played an active roll and was physically there in the story.


3: Poem begins with a statement of the theme. The Illiad starts like this "Rage: Sing, Goddess, Achilles rage" which begins with, obviously, the theme of rage and anger.


The image of superman represents an epic to me because superman is amazing and larger than life. He can do things a normal person could never do. Plus the only thing that can kill him is kryptonite. He also has a dad that could be classified as a god (he could be too).