Statius

Statius' Achilleid is perhaps the most remarkable of all Latin epic poems. Yet the completed first book and the earliest part of the second have a charm and freshness matched only in some of Ovid's most lively and engaging work. Its project - to tell the whole life of Achilles - was cut short by the poet's untimely death.

There he fell in love with the beautiful Deidamia, but at the same time, with the idea of glory in war. The poem tells how the sea-nymph Thetis, in a vain attempt to save her son from his destined end in the Trojan war, hid him on the island of Scyros, disguised as a girl. His feminine disguise was eventually penetrated by Ulysses and Diomedes, who tricked him into exposure of his truly warlike aspirations.

In relating this story Statius explores the nature of gender and the limits of the epic genre, while playfully and wittily positioning himself in the epic - and