Book Club Discussion Questions
For supplemental discussion material see our Beyond the Book article, Vergil and our BookBrowse Review of Lavinia.
Please be aware that this discussion guide will contain spoilers!
Introduction
In
The Aeneid, Vergil's hero fights to claim the king's daughter,
Lavinia, with whom he is destined to found an empire. In this novel, Lavinia is
given a voice and perspective all her own, which she uses to tell both the story
of ancient Italy's first great people—the Latins—and of the great hero Aeneas's
final years spent as her husband and king to Italy's people.
Against the backdrop of a half-wild world of gods and prophecies, great halls
and muddy villages, Lavinia grows from a young girl of carefree joy to a young
woman haunted by the madness of her mother and the responsibilities of her
father. As is her duty, she meekly entertains the attention of suitors who would
marry her to gain her father's crown, until a strange vision-dream of a poet
reveals her unexpected future. Embracing her fate, Lavinia struggles against
those forces that threaten her father's hard-won peace and her foretold marriage
to a foreign hero who has yet to land on Italy's shores.
Lavinia is a book of love and war, generous and austerely beautiful, from a
writer working at the height of her powers.
Discussion Points
- On page 3, Lavinia says that "as far as I know, it was my poet who gave
me any reality at all. Before he wrote, I was the mistiest of figures,
scarcely more than a name in genealogy." How does Le Guin address the
concept of immortality—and the role of poetry in creating it—throughout the
novel?
- Lavinia says that, like the farmers who lay their bodies against the
hard earth of Gaia, the Earth Mother, she, too, knows what it's like to have
a hard mother. What other examples of "mother" imagery can you identify
throughout the book? Compare and contrast the various parent-child
relationships found between these characters.
- When Lavinia describes herself as meek and silent, do you think she has
a low opinion of herself, or is she just being humble? Or is she being
ironic? What finally enables her to speak strongly and without fear, to her
mother and to others?
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- How does the author develop themes of identity and belonging throughout the narrative?
- What role does the setting play in shaping the characters' decisions and relationships?
- Discuss how the ending reframes the events of the story. Were you surprised?
Unless otherwise stated, this discussion guide is reprinted with the permission of Harvest Books.
Any page references refer to a USA edition of the book, usually the trade paperback version, and may vary in other editions.
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