SOURCE: An introduction to The "Argonautica" of Apol-lonius Rhodius, edited by George W. Mooney, Longmans, Green and Co., 1912, pp. 26-48.

In the following excerpt, Mooney provides an overview of the Argonautica, describes some of its chief characteristics, including its unsurpassed use of similes, but (with the exception of Medea) criticizes its characterizations as vague.

The Argonautica

… Apollonius chose for his theme the legend of the Argonauts, the quest of the golden fleece. For the purposes of an epic poem such a theme was well adapted. The voyage of the Argo, the first vessel which ploughed the lonely deep, was placed in a remote past antecedent to the poems of Homer, to the siege of Troy, and the wanderings of Odysseus.¹ The origin of the legend is wrapped in the mist of antiquity. Whether there is any historical basis for it or not we cannot say.² It may have...