The aim of this important and still valuable book--first published in 1968 but never before available in paperback--is to help all who approach Virgil's "Aeneid seriously, whether in the original Latin or in English translation, to read it with discernment and appreciation. It offers itself as neither a bandbook nor a commentary, but as critical description of the poem's structure and aspects of its composition. It begins with a preliminary exploration of the poem's central purpose; a careful reconstruction of its literary and historical context (following the battle of Actium in 31 BC, which made Augustus Caeser master of the Roman world); and a description of the main outlines of its structure. At the book's core is a detailed analysis of each of the epic's twelve books, with particular emphasis on the later, less often read ones; and this is followed by two further chapters, one dealing with Virgil's use of form and some related theroetical problems, the other with a closer exmaination of the poem's verbal fabric.