Virgil is everyone's favorite Roman poet, and he becomes sort of the first superstar poet in the Roman world. Virgil liked Homer's epics so much that he gave them a reboot with a Roman twist. Aeneas was a kind of minor character in Homer's original epics, but Virgil put him at the center of the action.
In Virgil's epic poem, The Aeneid, few Trojans survive the destruction of their city at the hands of their Greek enemies. A prince, Aeneas, leads a band of those fleeing Troy - but the journey is fraught with deadly storms and hungry monsters.
But Aeneas takes a positive view of the struggles he and the other Trojans face, telling them to be proud of their resilience and courage. With the help of MIT classics professor Stephanie Frampton, Dr Laurie Santos explores how The Aeneid can be read as a tale of post-traumatic growth and how we can sometimes emerge happier and stronger from tragic events.
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