This is CBSI in the world. I'm John Batchel. It's great fun to spend time with two

classicists who have translated the Aeneid because I'm aware of the fact that we're telling a

whopper of a tale in pieces. You know, it's like this is the the thriller highlights that we put up on the screen

for you to watch the whole movie. So come now to the history of this incredible whopper.

Scott, it came to me as I was reading over, not necessarily looking for it, that they kept coming back and back

justification for the civil war conduct of the Romans and that they were destined. That word is

overused here. It was written in stone and the gods agreed that Rome would be founded by these violent events,

and that everything in the future would be predicted at the time of the founding of the city,

including the battle of the success that Octavian had, becoming the emperor.

So at some point it occurred to me, I said, this is Roman exceptionalism.

That's how this document could be used. Was it used that way, Scott?

I think it's, as you say, it certainly could be, and I do believe it was, and I believe it's been,

I mean, it's been read like that until today, right, as a document,

justifying Rome. And the idea that Rome is the faded power of the world, the faded empire

of the world, that is written into the poem, I think, without question, right? Certainly certain

passages in the poem, one in book one, one in book six, one in book eight, they explicitly make the case.

There are ways to kind of complicating that reading, but I do think it's there.

And I do think, you know, that that is a part of what Virgil is up to.

But it doesn't tell the whole story, because if this were just a kind of propaganda piece for Rome, it would have historical interest, sure. But I don't think it would have deep kind of literary interest and the kind of literary interest that's kept it alive for 2,000 years. I think what Virgil is able to do is to some degree champion Rome and champion Rome is the faded exceptional empire of history.

But he also brings out the human side of that.

It's a grand historical story told at the human scale fundamentally.

And important to that is the tremendous sympathy that he shows to all his characters, especially Dido. Of course, Dido opposes

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