VIRGIL

The author of the poem in twelve books the ‘Aeneid’,  of the ‘Eclogues’ or ‘Bucolic’ and ‘Georgics’ (a treatise on agriculture) is one of the greatest in Roman poetry. Born in the what nowadays is Northern Italy, in 70 BC and deceased in the year 19 BC, Virgil learnt Botany and Medicine and Rhetoric in the best intellectually circles in Mantua, Cremona, Milan, Rome and Naples. Despite being the son of peasants, the politic Gaius Maecenas sponsored his education –from there we have taken up the definition of patronage for the person who promotes and protects the artists–.

As for his philosophical bent, he followed Epicurus (we have talked about him on a previous post) and Plato, although in his influences we can find a good blend of the thinkers of the classical world.

He spent eleven years composing his masterpiece, the ‘Aeneid’, to depart for Greece and Asia Minor when finished, and he was already ill. There is the anecdote of him before dying asking the Emperor Augustus to destroy this poem. Luckily, Augustus refused to, and nowadays we can enjoy not only the impeccable style of Virgil, but the compendium of genres and historical events that fhe included in this and his other writings. Let’s remember Virgil through his quotes:

Fortune favors the bold.

 

The destination opens the routes.

 

The ones who can are those who believe they can.

 

Love conquers all things; let’s give way to love.

 

Do not bow to adversity; rather oppose it boldly as much as your luck allows you to.

 

As the river runs, the mountains give us shadow and the sky has stars, should last the memory of benefits received in the mind of the grateful man.

 

Persevere, and hope for a better tomorrow.

 

One gets tired of everything but of trying to understand.

 

Anger improvises the weapons.

 

Perhaps those who love forge their dreams?

I wish you a very poetic week,

Álex Rovira