9–30: Sister Act I: Dido’s Address to Anna

Steve Jenkin

November 29, 2012

¶ 1 Leave a comment on paragraph 1 0 24.       Outline the structure of Dido’s speech. What devices does Virgil use to mark the different segments?

¶ 2 Leave a comment on paragraph 2 0 25.       Compare and contrast Virgil’s account of Dido’s condition in lines 1–8 with Dido’s own account in lines 9–30.

¶ 3 Leave a comment on paragraph 3 0 26.       Sketch the thought-process that Dido goes through while talking to her sister. Why does she burst out in tears when she has finally reached the decision not to act on her love for Aeneas?

¶ 4 Leave a comment on paragraph 4 0 27.       What, precisely, are the nightmarish visions (9: insomnia) that Dido says frighten her?

¶ 5 Leave a comment on paragraph 5 0 28.       armis (11) comes either from armus (‘shoulder’) or from arma (‘arms’). Which alternative do you prefer and why? Was Virgil perhaps deliberately ambiguous? If so, why?

¶ 6 Leave a comment on paragraph 6 0 29.       On what grounds does Dido believe in Aeneas’ divine lineage? (Cf. 12: credo equidem, nec uana fides, genus esse deorum.) Is her reasoning sound?

¶ 7 Leave a comment on paragraph 7 0 30.       Why is it a bit strange that Dido endorses the principle that fear betokens degeneracy (cf. 13: degeneres animos timor arguit!)?

¶ 8 Leave a comment on paragraph 8 0 31.       Lines 13–14 (heu, quibus ille/ iactatus fatis! quae bella exhausta canebat!) feature several words that also occur in the proem (1.1–7). Which ones are they? And what is the effect of their recurrence here?

¶ 9 Leave a comment on paragraph 9 0 32.       What are the fata (cf. 14: fatis) that Dido refers to? Who is her source of information?

¶ 10 Leave a comment on paragraph 10 0 33.       Lines 15–19 contain one long conditional sequence. The protasis is made up of two si-clauses: si…sederet and si…pertaesum…fuisset. Discuss the switch in tense from imperfect subjunctive (sederet) to pluperfect subjunctive (pertaesum … fuisset).

¶ 11 Leave a comment on paragraph 11 0 34.       In line 17 (postquam primus amor deceptam morte fefellit), Dido mentions an earlier moment in her biography defined by the coincidence of love (amor) and death (mors). What is the significance of this thematic nexus for the plot of Aeneid 4?

¶ 12 Leave a comment on paragraph 12 0 35.       Discuss the seemingly ambiguous syntax of huic uni in line 19.

¶ 13 Leave a comment on paragraph 13 0 36.       What does the culpa consist in that Dido refers to (19)? How does Virgil’s use of the word here affect our reading of 172 (coniugium vocat; hoc praetexit nomine culpam)?

¶ 14 Leave a comment on paragraph 14 0 37.       What stylistic device does Virgil use in the phrase miseri post fata Sychaei/ coniugis (20–1) and to what effect?

¶ 15 Leave a comment on paragraph 15 0 38.       Explain the subjunctives optem (24), dehiscat (24) and adigat (25).

¶ 16 Leave a comment on paragraph 16 0 39.       Analyse the verbal architecture of line 26: pallentis umbras Erebo noctemque profundam.

¶ 17 Leave a comment on paragraph 17 0 40.       What, exactly, does pudor mean (both in general and for Dido) and what are its iura? (27).

¶ 18 Leave a comment on paragraph 18 0 41.       In line 27 Dido addresses her pudor. According to one scholar, ‘the apostrophe distances pudor from her by turning it into another external force, which makes one wonder where her own pudor, previously a key internal attribute of her person, has gone’. Discuss.

¶ 19 Leave a comment on paragraph 19 0 42.       Explore the formal and thematic relationship between impulit (23) and abstulit (29).

¶ 20 Leave a comment on paragraph 20 0 43.       In what ways is the last word of Dido’s speech (29: sepulcro) programmatically significant?

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