74-89: Dido attempts to win over Aeneas; the effect of her condition on the construction of Carthage

Question 1

nunc

Answer 1

brings us abruptly from the simile back to the narrative, where the hunted and wounded Dido is now the doomed huntress

Question 2

Aenean secum

Answer 2

placement in the centre of the line enacts meaning; conveys the strength of her proactivity, that they are physically right alongside each other

Question 3

per moenia

Answer 3

Aeneas has infiltrated the city walls, Dido lays herself and her city open to him, unwittingly commencing the downfall of both

Question 4

Sidoniasque… opes urbemque paratam

Answer 4

chiastic, opes and urbem in the centre: opes = her past, urbem = her future - together they extend a warm invitation to Aeneas, very much like a sales-pitch: he has little money and no city

Question 5

paratam, incipit

Answer 5

asyndetic continuation of main clauses reflects the strength of her focus on wooing Aeneas

Question 6

incipit… media… resistit

Answer 6

verse-design is enactment at its finest, incipit at the beginning, media in the middle and resistit at the end: this stop-start reflects the effort Dido makes to muster up the courage to address Aeneas

Question 7

Iliacos iterum demens audire labores

Answer 7

chiasmus with demens in the centre highlights the insanity of Dido in making such a request, given how reluctant Aeneas was to grant it in book 2. It is no way to endear herself to him.

‘Iliacos… labores’ hyperbaton stresses the grief that reliving these woes evokes in Aeneas.

Question 8

exposcit

Answer 8

enjambment reflects the ill-considered nature of the request

Question 9

ab ore

Answer 9

idiom adds a physical aspect to her passion; evoking her desire to touch him as well as listen to him

Question 10

digressi… premit… suadent

Answer 10

tricolon hastily soothes everyone to sleep in a false sense of calm before the frenzied storm of Dido resurfaces

Question 11

sidera somnos

Answer 11

sibilance accentuates the scene’s tranquility

Question 12

sola

Answer 12

emphatic return to Dido on her own, who evidently does not sleep as the stars urge her to

Question 13

maeret

Answer 13

her yearning for his presence is so great that it leads to mourning

Question 14

incubat

Answer 14

enjambment reflects Dido’s solitary brooding

Question 15

illum absens absentem audit

Answer 15

ellisions reflect Aeneas’ absence

the glaring polyptoton constitutes a poignant paradox, which exposes as hallucination Dido’s sense that he remains present

Question 16

auditque videtque

Answer 16

arranged climactically in terms of the delusion in Dido they portray: it is almost plausible she could hear him, but there’s no way she can see him

the redundant -que after videt compounds the delusion, whilst the concluding videt confirms we have entered Dido’s fevered imagination

Question 17

aut

Answer 17

marks abrupt chronological break, as the action described must refer to a point earlier in time, which show her madness increasing

Question 18

non… adsurgunt… non… exercet… parant

Answer 18

tricolon of verbs describes the disastrous effects of Dido in love on her city-building project, emphasised by the anaphora of ‘non’

Question 19

opera… minae… machina

Answer 19

tricolon of nouns, all ‘hanging’ on ‘pendent’, does the same

Question 20

minae… muorum… machina

Answer 20

‘m’ alliteration mourns the abandonment of a city with such potential for greatness