The Epic Hero

by Dean A. Miller

Overview

Selected by Choice Magazine as an Outstanding Academic Title

From Odysseus to Aeneas, from Beowulf to King Arthur, from the Mahâbhârata to the Ossetian "Nart" tales, epic heroes and their stories have symbolized the power of the human imagination. Drawing on diverse disciplines including classics, anthropology, psychology, and literary studies, this product of twenty years' scholarship provides a detailed typology of the hero in Western myth: birth, parentage, familial ties, sexuality, character, deeds, death, and afterlife. Dean A. Miller examines the place of the hero in the physical world (wilderness, castle, prison cell) and in society (among monarchs, fools, shamans, rivals, and gods). He looks at the hero in battle and quest; at his political status; and at his relationship to established religion. The book spans Western epic traditions, including Greek, Roman, Nordic, and Celtic, as well as the Indian and Persian legacies. A large section of the book also examines the figures who modify or accompany the hero: partners, helpers (animals and sometimes monsters), foes, foils, and even antitypes. The Epic Hero provides a comprehensive and provocative guide to epic heroes, and to the richly imaginative tales they inhabit.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780801870941
Publisher:	Johns Hopkins University Press
Publication date:	10/23/2002
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	520
Product dimensions:	6.25(w) x 9.25(h) x 1.07(d)
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Dean A. Miller is a professor emeritus of history and comparative religion at the University of Rochester.

Table of Contents

Introduction. The Book of the Hero
Chapter 1. The Hero from on High
Chapter 2. The Heroic Biography
Chapter 3. The Framework of Adventure
Chapter 4. The Hero "Speaks"
Chapter 5. Foils, Fools, and Antiheroes
Chapter 6. Tertium Quid: Aspects of Liminality
Chapter 7. The Final Hero: Beyond Immortality
Notes
Index

What People are Saying About This

C. Scott Littleton

Miller has made a fundamental contribution to scholarship that transcends everything so far published on this subject, including the works of Rank, Raglan, and, indeed, the late Joseph Campbell and his army of admirers. To put it simply, he has produced a masterpiece!

From the Publisher

Miller has made a fundamental contribution to scholarship that transcends everything so far published on this subject, including the works of Rank, Raglan, and, indeed, the late Joseph Campbell and his army of admirers. To put it simply, he has produced a masterpiece!
—C. Scott Littleton, Occidental College

Editorial Reviews

This study, rich and plentiful but also subtle and suggestive, will serve as a reference work for a broad range of researchers in contiguous disciplines (ancient studies, comparative religion, history, philosophy).

Latomus - François Ripoll

"This study, rich and plentiful but also subtle and suggestive, will serve as a reference work for a broad range of researchers in contiguous disciplines (ancient studies, comparative religion, history, philosophy)."

Latomus - François Ripoll

The range is vast and covers most of Western epic literature—Greek, Celtic, Nordic, Roman, Persian, and Indian . . . [Miller] has provided not only a wealth of information on the epic hero, but he shows why the hero presented in the epic mode has held human imagination for so long.
—Religious Studies Review

Miller boldly but intelligently maps out a variety of aspects under which both epic heroism in general and particular can fruitfully be considered. He also discusses an almost intimidating range of material . . . For Miller, rather refreshingly, the real heroes are Homer's Achilles and his counterparts in, say, Icelandic sagas, not such tricksters, politicians, and priests as Odysseus, Hector, and Aeneas. Miller rightly refocuses attention, furthermore, not only on such well-documented elements of this warrior-hero as his ambivalence and liminality, but also on his enduring, if disturbing, appeal.
—B. D. A. Tipping, Journal of Roman Studies

Miller commands an impressive range of material, and his original synthesis offers valuable insights to students of ancient and medieval literature.
—Choice

Why does an epic hero tend to act so arrogantly and destructively? Miller offers a convincing answer to this question, which arises with the emergence of modern consciousness, in light of the hero's functional social position an dhis essentially adolescent, flat interior . . . with thoughtful insight and thorough scholarship, Miller's book is a major piece of research that cannot be ignored in any future discussion of the epic and its ever-dazzling hero.
—Masaki Mori, The Comparatist

This study, rich and plentiful but also subtle and suggestive, will serve as a reference work for a broad range of researchers in contiguous disciplines (ancient studies, comparative religion, history, philosophy).
—François Ripoll, Latomus

Given his wide reading and his instinct for the telling detail, Miller's observations are truly pregnant; they stimulate the mind to incubate new connections.
—Norman Austin, International Journal of the Classical Tradition

From the Publisher

Miller boldly but intelligently maps out a variety of aspects under which both epic heroism in general and particular can fruitfully be considered. He also discusses an almost intimidating range of material . . . For Miller, rather refreshingly, the real heroes are Homer's Achilles and his counterparts in, say, Icelandic sagas, not such tricksters, politicians, and priests as Odysseus, Hector, and Aeneas. Miller rightly refocuses attention, furthermore, not only on such well-documented elements of this warrior-hero as his ambivalence and liminality, but also on his enduring, if disturbing, appeal.

Journal of Roman Studies - B. D. A. Tipping

Why does an epic hero tend to act so arrogantly and destructively? Miller offers a convincing answer to this question, which arises with the emergence of modern consciousness, in light of the hero's functional social position an dhis essentially adolescent, flat interior . . . with thoughtful insight and thorough scholarship, Miller's book is a major piece of research that cannot be ignored in any future discussion of the epic and its ever-dazzling hero.

The Comparatist - Masaki Mori

Given his wide reading and his instinct for the telling detail, Miller's observations are truly pregnant; they stimulate the mind to incubate new connections.

International Journal of the Classical Tradition - Norman Austin

Miller commands an impressive range of material, and his original synthesis offers valuable insights to students of ancient and medieval literature.

Choice

The range is vast and covers most of Western epic literature—Greek, Celtic, Nordic, Roman, Persian, and Indian . . . [Miller] has provided not only a wealth of information on the epic hero, but he shows why the hero presented in the epic mode has held human imagination for so long.

Religious Studies Review

Given his wide reading and his instinct for the telling detail, Miller's observations are truly pregnant; they stimulate the mind to incubate new connections.

— Norman Austin

International Journal of the Classical Tradition

This study, rich and plentiful but also subtle and suggestive, will serve as a reference work for a broad range of researchers in contiguous disciplines (ancient studies, comparative religion, history, philosophy).

— François Ripoll

Latomus

Why does an epic hero tend to act so arrogantly and destructively? Miller offers a convincing answer to this question, which arises with the emergence of modern consciousness, in light of the hero's functional social position an dhis essentially adolescent, flat interior... with thoughtful insight and thorough scholarship, Miller's book is a major piece of research that cannot be ignored in any future discussion of the epic and its ever-dazzling hero.

— Masaki Mori

The Comparatist

Miller boldly but intelligently maps out a variety of aspects under which both epic heroism in general and particular can fruitfully be considered. He also discusses an almost intimidating range of material... For Miller, rather refreshingly, the real heroes are Homer's Achilles and his counterparts in, say, Icelandic sagas, not such tricksters, politicians, and priests as Odysseus, Hector, and Aeneas. Miller rightly refocuses attention, furthermore, not only on such well-documented elements of this warrior-hero as his ambivalence and liminality, but also on his enduring, if disturbing, appeal.

— B. D. A. Tipping

Journal of Roman Studies