Ancient Greek civilization produced epic, while modern civilization produced novel. What are some possible reasons for this transformation?

Ancient Greek civilization produced the literary epic
(especially Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey), while
modern civilization produces very few epic but does produce novels in abundance.  What
are some possible reasons for this difference? Several explanations suggest themselves,
including the following:

• Ancient
  Greek society was a primarily aristocratic society that celebrated the deeds of
  aristocratic heroes. Modern societies tend to be democratic societies, in which all
  people are presumed to be equals. Novels focus on the interactions between relatively
  equal persons; epics focus mainly on the interactions between
  aristocrats.


• The ancient Greeks believed in gods who took
  an active interest in human beings, especially in human aristocrats. The gods often
  actively intervened in the lives of these people, and indeed the gods themselves often
  resembled humans in their personalities and motives. Modern novels, with their interest
  in the behavior of actual human beings, very rarely present God as a character; to do so
  would almost seem sacrilegious. Christianity assumes that all humans are created equal
  in the eyes of God; therefore, the novel once again tends to focus on the interactions
  of people who are relatively equal.  Consider, for instance, the opening line of Jane
  Austen’s Pride and Prejudice, often considered one of the greatest
  novels ever written:

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It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a
single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a
wife.

The emphasis of this
book, as in so many other novels, is on a distinctly human society operating in a
decidedly recognizable human world.

In contrast, consider
the opening of Homer’s Iliad:

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Sing, O goddess, the anger of Achilles son of
Peleus, that brought countless ills upon the
Achaeans.

Here the poem opens
with a reference to a goddess, immediately mentions a great hero, and then stresses the
sufferings of an entire people.

One significant difference,
then, is that the novel tends to be a much more democratic, this-worldly genre than the
ancient Greek epic, while the ancient Greek epic tends to be a much more aristocratic,
supernaturally oriented genre, with a strong emphasis on gods and the direct
interventions of gods in human affairs.