If your country doesn't have a national epic poem it's pretty much a non-country.
Pic related, it's The Lusiadas.
As armas e os barões assinalados,
Que da ocidental praia Lusitana,
Por mares nunca de antes navegados,
Passaram ainda além da Taprobana,
Em perigos e guerras esforçados,
Mais do que prometia a força humana,
E entre gente remota edificaram
Novo Reino, que tanto sublimaram;
Actually taken as a whole the national epic of England is probably Shakespeare's Henriad (Richard II, Henry IV Part 1, Henry IV Part 2 and Henry V).
O for a Muse of fire, that would ascend
The brightest heaven of invention,
A kingdom for a stage, princes to act
And monarchs to behold the swelling scene!
Then should the warlike Harry, like himself,
Assume the port of Mars; and at his heels,
Leash'd in like hounds, should famine, sword and fire
Crouch for employment. But pardon, and gentles all,
The flat unraised spirits that have dared
On this unworthy scaffold to bring forth
So great an object: can this cockpit hold
The vasty fields of France? or may we cram
Within this wooden O the very casques
That did affright the air at Agincourt?
>>7374925
Our epics are Beowulf, The Faerie Queene, and Paradise Lost
>>7375250
English is an objectively based language tbhfam. It would be painful to live in a country like Finland which has never produced a worthwhile piece of literature in history.
>>7375320
Tbf mate they do have the Kalevala
>>7375320
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kalevala
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alastalon_salissa
>>7375320
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Egyptian
http://ganjoor.net/ferdousi/shahname/
http://www.ancienttexts.org/library/mesopotamian/gilgamesh/
https://ar.wikisource.org/wiki/%D8%A3%D9%84%D9%81_%D9%84%D9%8A%D9%84%D8%A9_%D9%88%D9%84%D9%8A%D9%84%D8%A9
http://mrdanfarrell.weebly.com/uploads/2/7/8/5/27857657/sinuhe.pdf
>>7374925
New worlder here. The Lusiadas represents us.
Ah, čijem si se zahvalila,
tašta ljudska oholasti?
Sve što više stereš krila,
sve ćeš paka niže pasti!
Vjekovite i bez svrhe
nije pod suncem krepke stvari,
a u visocijeh gora vrhe
najprije ognjen trijes udari.
Bez pomoći višnje s nebi
svijeta je stavnos svijem bjeguća:
satiru se sama u sebi
silna carstva i moguća.
Kolo od sreće uokoli
vrteći se ne pristaje:
tko bi gori, eto je doli,
a tko doli gori ustaje.
Sad vrh sablje kruna visi,
sad vrh krune sablja pada,
sad na carstvo rob se uzvisi,
a tko car bi, rob je sada.
Proz nesreće sreća iznosi,
iz krvi se kruna crpe,
a oni kijeh se boje mnozi
strah od mnozijeh i oni trpe.
Od izdajstvâ i od zasjeda
ograđena je glava u cara,
a u čas se zgoda ugleda
od ke ne bi pametara.
>>7375320
>I haven't read a single Finnish book so their literature must be worthless
>>7375602
>>only Finnish novel ever to be made into hollywood film
>JUST
>your books are bad if they aren't adapted into cheap American spectacles
>>7374886
>tfw german
>too many poems to chose from
>>7374886
Gonçalves Dias > Camões
>>7375250
Beowulf seems more relevant to Norse culture and Paradise Lost is more of a Christian epic than national one. The Faerie Queene and the Henriad are the best fitting choices IMO.
>>7375680
He didn't compose any epic.
>>7376287
>what is I-Juca-Pirama ?
Also he died before completing Os Timbiras.
