Love can seem like a wonderful thing that everyone will go through in their life, but it’s not all it’s cracked up to be. Sometimes, love can be one of the worst things humans will go through, especially with some of the lies, deceitfulness, and pain that come about. In “Book IV: The Passion of the Queen,” of Virgil’s The Aeneid, Queen Dido is tremendously hurt after falling in love and developing an obsession with Aeneas. Virgil uses Dido and Aeneas’s relationship to show that love is painful and will make people do irrational actions. Virgil first shows that love is painful by including the thoughts of Dido. Once she becomes infatuated with Aeneas and is constantly around him, her thoughts become all about him. Once Dido and Aeneas start to get into predicaments that end horribly, her thoughts turn for the worse. “Now she took thought of one way or another / at the first chance, to end her hated life... “ (IV.845-846). This quote shows that their love for each other was not some romantic love story that she was
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Death or suicide can be a very driving point in many stories, and for book IV of the Aeneid, it was definitely a major factor in the end. Dido was in a final state of despair with the relationship that her and Aeneas had, and could no longer bare to live. “Amid these words her household people saw her, crumpled over the steel blade, and the blade aflush with red blood, drenched her hands.” (IV.887-889). This quote creates the violent and gruesome image of her death and how many people actually found out that she had done so. Not only does Queen Dido die, but Aeneas does as well. “Since Aeneas eventually dies in an Italian river...”(IV.521). This may not have been as gruesome as throwing oneself onto a blade, but drowning can be pretty brutal. To drive home Virgil’s point about love, the last thing he included and described was the death of Queen Dido and
Death or suicide can be a very driving point in many stories, and for book IV of the Aeneid, it was definitely a major factor in the end. Dido was in a final state of despair with the relationship that her and Aeneas had, and could no longer bare to live. “Amid these words her household people saw her, crumpled over the steel blade, and the blade aflush with red blood, drenched her hands.” (IV.887-889). This quote creates the violent and gruesome image of her death and how many people actually found out that she had done so. Not only does Queen Dido die, but Aeneas does as well. “Since Aeneas eventually dies in an Italian river...”(IV.521). This may not have been as gruesome as throwing oneself onto a blade, but drowning can be pretty brutal. To drive home Virgil’s point about love, the last thing he included and described was the death of Queen Dido and