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The epic is a broadly defined genre of poetry, which retells in a continuous narrative the life and works of a heroic or mythological person or group of persons. In the West, the Iliad, Odyssey and Nibelungenlied; and in the East, the Mahabharata, Ramayana, and Shahnama are often cited as examples of the epic genre.

1 Epic versus narrative

One factor that distinguishes epics from other forms of narrative poetry is scale: epic poems tend to be too long to be read or performed in a single sitting. A second distinguishing factor is stylistic: epic poems are written in what might be termed high style, avoiding popular metres and verse patterns. For example, an epic written in English would not use the ballad form.

Thirdly, epic poems always deal with persons and events that are considered to be historically real by the poet and their audience. Epics are, essentially, the tale of the tribe. In oral cultures, the learning and performance of epic poems frequently formed an integral part of the education of the poet and, by extension, the audience. This assumed historicity is important for distinguishing epic from other long narrative forms such as allegoryAn allegory (from Greek αλλος, allos "other", and αγορευειν, agoreuein "to speak in public") is a figurative representation conveying a meaning other than and in ad.

The fourth distinguishing factor in the definition of an epic is what is termed the epic heroThis article is about the type of character. For other meanings, see Hero (disambiguation . Sir Galahad, a prototypical hero In many myths and folk tales, a hero is a man or woman (then often called a heroine , traditionally the protagonist of a story, le cycle. The hero in an epic poem tends to follow a predictable cycle of events that is repeated in epics from every sort of culture. Although the cycle may repeat upon itself and vary slightly in order from epic to epic, the general points of the cycle include a charge (e.g. from a god to complete a quest); a test (to test worthiness to complete said quest), various mythical, human, or animal helpers; a main antagonist, often supernatural; a magical/unreal world, unable to be visited by a normal human, that the hero visits (e.g. the underworld or the world of the gods); an escape from the quest/low point (the hero questions the validity of his quest and seeks to escape from his responsibility); a resurrection (either from being dead or from a dead-like state of mind, such as an unwillingness to complete the quest, and may also be a hero who was thought to be dead who was rediscovered); and a restoration (e.g. a kingThis article treats the generic title monarch . For the origins of the word king and its English use, see Germanic king. For other meanings of the word, see Monarch (disambiguation A monarch is a type of ruler or head of state. The word derives from Greek restored to his throneThis article is about royal thrones, for the order of angels by the same name see Thrones. The Throne of Canada Thrones for The Queen of Canada, and the Duke of Edinburgh and the Governor General, in the Canadian Senate, Ottawa. A throne is the official c). George LucasGeorge Walton Lucas Jr (born May 14, 1944) is an American film director famous for his epic Star Wars and Indiana Jones trilogies. Star Wars in 1977 is considered by some to be the first " high concept" film, although others feel the first was Steven Spie' original Star WarsAlternate meaning: Strategic Defense Initiative Star Wars is the name of a series of science fantasy movies, a literary franchise, and a series of video games based on the ideas of filmmaker and writer George Lucas, which consist of numerous prequels, seq trilogy, in particular, follows this cycle exactly, and some have cited it as the reason for its mass appeal.