Notebook # 15

What is an Epic?  A long narrative poem written in formal, elegant language  Tells about a series of quests undertaken by a great hero  Hero is a warrior who embodies the values cherished by the culture who is reciting the epic

Epic  Oldest stories in the world are epics  2000 B.C. Mesopotamians told the epic of Gilgamesh, hero searching for eternal life  500 B.C. Greeks recited the Iliad and Odyssey, epics of great Trojan War Heroes  700 A.D. Anglo-Saxons told the tale of Beowulf, who saved his kingdom from two swamp monsters

What is a Mock Epic?  A short narrative poem that imitates the old epic tales, but in a comical way  Minimal use of Elegant language  Slang is used  “Hero” is not on a quest

Ernest Lawrence Thayer ( )  Journalist  Submitted “Casey at the Bat” to the San Francisco Examiner in  Did not sign his real name to his work  Used his nickname, Phin, from his days at Harvard instead.

Poem’s growing presence  After the poem was published by the Examiner, William De Wolf Hopper, a vaudeville entertainer was given a copy of the poem.  He memorized it quickly and recited it at a baseball night performance where the audience went wild.  Hopper used this to help boost his career

Poem’s popularity  Even though the poem was becoming widely known, Thayer refused to take ownership for many years  He claimed it was badly written  When Thayer finally admitted to writing the Mock epic, he refused to take any money that had been made from the epic  He asked to “never be reminded of it again.”