National Epic - Prose Epics

Prose Epics

Some prose works, while not strictly epic poetry, have an important place in the national consciousness of their nations. These include the following:

• Britain -
  • Historia Regum Britanniae
  • Le Morte d'Arthur
• Canada -
  • Anne of Green Gables
  • Wacousta
• Catalonia -
  • • Gesta comitum Barcinonensium
  • The Four Great Chronicles:
    • Llibre dels fets
    • Crònica de Bernat Desclot
    • Crònica de Ramon Muntaner
    • Crònica de Pere el Cerimoniós
  • Tirant lo Blanch, an epic romance, one of the best works of Catalan medieval literature.
• China -
  • Romance of the Three Kingdoms (novel)
  • Water Margin (novel)
  • Fengshen Yanyi (novel)
  • Journey to the West (novel)
  • Dream of the Red Chamber (novel)
• Colombia -
  • Cien Años de Soledad, (One Hundred Years of Solitude) a contemporary novel that parallels Colombian history in the fictional town of Macondo.
  • La Vorágine, (The Vortex) a contemporary novel with prosaic poetic interuldes that depicts life in the great pastures, the immensity and overwhelming nature of the Amazon jungle and the appalling conditions under which workers in rubber factories toil.
  • En la Diestra de Dios Padre, (At God's Right Side) a costumbrist novel depicting life and culture in the Paisa region
  • María, a costumbrist novel.
• Ecuador
  • Cumandá Romantico national novel written by Juan León Mera
• England -
  • The Ecclesiastical History of the English People by Bede
• Ethiopia - Kebra Nagast
• Flanders (Dutch-speaking part of Belgium) -
  • De Leeuw van Vlaanderen ("The Lion of Flanders")
• France - Les Misérables (A novel spanning a crucial era of French History)
• Germany - The Sorrows of Young Werther (a widely influential epistolary tragic novel)
• Scandinavia and Iceland - The Prose Edda by Snorri Sturluson
• Ireland
  • Táin Bó Cúailnge (Prose narration with poetic interludes)
  • Ulysses (20th Century adaptation of Homer's Odyssey by James Joyce)
• Israel / Jewish people - Torah (especially the Book of Exodus), along with rest of the Tanakh, i.e. the Hebrew Bible
• Italy -
  • The Betrothed by Alessandro Manzoni
• Japan -
  • The Tale of Genji (Genji Monogatari) by Murasaki Shikibu
• Korea - Samguk Yusa (prose with songs)
• Lithuania - Anykščių šilelis by Antanas Baranauskas
• Mayans - Popol Vuh
• Mongolia -
  • Borte Chino
  • The Secret History of the Mongols (Genghis Khan's biography)
• Netherlands
  • Van den vos Reynaerde - (The local Netherlandic tale about the trickster fox reynard) by an anonymous 13th century Dutch writer)
  • Max Havelaar - Multatuli
  • De avonden - Gerard Reve
• Norway - Heimskringla by Snorri Sturluson
• Poland
  • Stara Baśń - Józef Ignacy Kraszewski
  • The Trilogy - Henryk Sienkiewicz
  • Chłopi - Władysław Reymont
• Portugal - Peregrinação (see Fernão Mendes Pinto)
• Philippines
  • Maragtas
  • Noli Me Tangere
  • El filibusterismo
  • Banaag at Sikat
  • Mga Ibong Mandaragit
  • Luha ng Buwaya
• Russia -
  • Zadonshchina
  • War and Peace
• Scotland- Robert Burns - Scots Wha Hae
• Spain - Don Quixote
• Sweden - The Emigrant Cycle
• Switzerland - William Tell (play)
• Tatar - "Chora Batir"
• Turkic peoples -
  • Alpamysh (all Central Asia)
  • Book of Dede Korkut (Oghuz nations: Azerbaijan, Turkey, Turkmenistan, Turcomans of Iraq, as well as Central Asia and other Turkic nations)
  • Oghuz-nameh (Oghuz nations: Azerbaijan, Turkey, Turkmenistan, and Turcomans of Iraq)
  • Ergenekon legend (Turkey)
  • Koroglu (Azerbaijan and Turkey)
  • Kutadgu Bilig (Central Asia, Uighurs and other Turkic nations)
• United States
  • Gone With the Wind
  • Moby-Dick
  • Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
  • The Grapes of Wrath
• Venezuela - Doña Bárbara
• Wales - the Mabinogion