Interpretive Essay 1 (Week 3)

Stephen Thornton

Dr. Jacobs

Great Books 1

09/04/18

Tragedy to Triumph

            The Aeneid is a Roman poem of tragedies where the tragedies resolve themselves in the end, but one must wonder how much a single man can stand. This man, Aeneas, is the Trojan son of the goddess Venus. He experiences tremendous hardships: the fall of his city, harsh treatment from the gods, and the uncertainty of finding a new home. Yet, one of the most prominent and devastating tragedies he endures is the death of his wife, Creusa. Creusa’s death plays a key role in the founding of Rome. From her grave she gives Aeneas the knowledge he needs to succeed, and this knowledge sets him free to mix Latin and Trojan blood conceiving the Roman race.

            During the Greek invasion, Aeneas grabs his wife and child and flees for safety. The book quotes that “Little Iulus, clutching/my right hand, keeps pace with tripping steps./My wife Creusa trails behind.” (II.899-901) Creusa dies as she lingers behind in search for safe haven with Aeneas and Iulus in “The Final Hours of Troy.” One arrives at several reasons as to why she is separated from Aeneas and eventually dies. Aeneas cries out “Oh dear god, my wife, Creusa - torn from me by by a brutal fate! What then did she stop in her tracks or lose her way? Or exhausted, sink down to rest? Who knows?” (II.915-918)

            After Aeneas discovers her disappearance, he returns to the crumbling city he loves in search of Creusa. As he searches in a state of panic, his wife’s ghost stops him. She states, “It’s not without the will of the gods that these things have come to pass. But the gods forbid you to take Creusa with you, bound from Troy together. The lofty king of Olympus won’t allow it.”   (II.963-967)  One concludes from these words that Creusa meets her fate as an act of the gods, and that the gods cut Aeneas off from all the pleasures he knows in Troy so he might fulfill his destiny. Creusa’s existence holds him back from finding his new kingdom and wife as Creusa tells him “The vast plains of the sea are yours to plow/until you reach Hesperian land, Lydian Tiber/flows with its smooth march through rich and loamy fields,/a land of hard people. There great joy and a kingdom/are yours to claim, and a queen to make your wife.” (II.968-972)

            Some believe that she dies because she is too slow, but the words of Creusa stated above clearly argue otherwise. Some also believe that Creusa dies by the gods because they are just adding to the hardships of Aeneas because faces a long hard road ahead of him. While Aeneas has a long hard road ahead of him, the book seems to tell the reader that Creusa dies for a purpose other than just blindly adding to his suffering. On page 102 Creusa tells Aeneas that he will inherit a kingdom, great joy, hardy people, and a wife. If he is destined to rule this land with another woman as his queen, then it is apparent that Creusa has exhausted her usefulness to Aeneas, and she is a weight around his ankles if she is left alive.

            The significance of Creusa’s being killed by the gods is that it assures Aeneas of his fate because Creusa’s ghost gives him the knowledge of what it is he has to do in the future and assures him of his destiny. Creusa’s death also is significant because she poses as one of the monumental obstacles to Aeneas’ founding of the Roman Empire. The reason for this significance is the Roman people are a mixture of the Latins and Trojans. This mixture is unattainable had Aeneas remained married to Creusa.

            So this Roman poem of tragedies does leave the reader wondering how much can Aeneas stand. Obviously, he shoulders great amount of weight. Through all his tragedies, even the necessary death of his beloved wife, Creusa, Aeneas still goes on to fulfill what he was born to do.