1. Compare The Mask of Apollo and The Last of the Wine. How are their themes and characters alike and how are they different?

2. Nikeratos acts tragedies on stage and observes them in life. Which events that he observes are tragic and which are merely unfortunate, pathetic, or regrettable?

3. Dionysius II is a clever but superficial and incomplete student of philosophy. Is it the student or the subject that fails?

4. Nikeratos says: "I was here to honor the god, in the precinct where if a man meets face to face his own father's murderer, still he must hold his hand" (chapter 11). This quotation exemplifies one of the purposes of ancient theater.

Compare and contrast the purposes and conventions of ancient and modern theater.

5. Read what Anchises tells Aeneas that the special prerogatives of the Greeks and the Romans are (Vergil's Aeneid...