Throughout the Commedia, love definitely plays an important role in the psychological path to get Dante through hell. The strongest way love is represented in the work is between Dante and Beatrice. Although Beatrice is not there physically for the Commedia, she really plays a great role spiritually as she is constantly praying for Virgil and Dante to make it through hell. Dante’s love for Beatrice is definitely real throughout the poem, and she definitely is the spiritual angel that helped inspire him to make it through hell. Without her great inspiration throughout the great work, who knows if Dante would have made it through hell.

Analyze a literary device–most likely an image or metaphor–or series of devices you find in Plato, Sappho, or Catullus.

Throughout out the poems of Sappho, the literary element of imagery is used. The reference of flowers and nature is constantly used to portray women and the goddesses of that time. Whether Sappho is talking about a young women or an ancient Greek goddess, the reference to flowers is used. Of course different flowers are used to describe different women.  This is continued throughout many of the poem, and really shows how men of this time looked at women to be so beautiful.

Although this is a very controversial question, Aeneas is indeed a hero throughout the great work. Aeneas may have done some things that portray him like a wimp, but his overall leadership and ability to fulfill his duties assigned by the gods make him a hero. It may sound dumb to consider Aeneas a hero when he ran away at a very bad time, but that strategic move was in turn the correct thing to do. Also, it is important to remember that the journey he had from Troy to Italy is not an easy one, and not everything is going to go as expected. The event that really displays his great leadership and qualities of a hero was in Book X when Aeneas violently took down the Latin troops. During this event he killed numerous prominent Latin leaders, the strongest one being Mezentius. This event was really a turning point in his journey, and really shows how he is a hero.