by Peter Jones
Reading Ovid
Reading Ovid presents a selection of stories from Ovid’s Metamorphoses, the most famous and in fluential collection of Greek and Roman myths in the world. It includes well-known stories like those of Daedalus and Icarus, Pygmalion, Narcissus and King Midas. The book is designed for those who have completed an introductory course in Latin and aims to help such users to enjoy the story-telling, character-drawing and language of one of the world’s most delightful and in fluential poets. The text is accompanied by full vocabulary, grammar and notes, with assistance based on two widely used beginners’ courses, Reading Latin and Wheelock’s Latin. Essays at the end of each passage are designed to point up important detail and to show how the logic of each story unfolds, while study sections offer ways of thinking further about the passage. No other intermediate text is so carefully designed to make reading Ovid a pleasure.
PETER JONES is well known as an author, journalist, lecturer and publiciser of classics. He is co-founder of the charity Friends of Classics and regularly contributes columns, reviews and features on classical topics in the national media in the UK. His books include Learn Latin (1998), An Intelligent Person’s Guide to Classics (2002) and (with Keith Sidwell) Reading Latin (1986).
Reading Ovid
Stories from the Metamorphōsēs
PETER JONES
CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS
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Cambridge University Press
The Edinburgh Building, Cambridge CB2 8RU, UK
Published in the United States of America by Cambridge University Press, New York
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Information on this title: www.cambridge.org/9780521849012
© Peter Jones 2007
This publication is in copyright. Subject to statutory exception and to the provisions of relevant collective licensing agreements, no reproduction of any part may take place without the written permission of Cambridge University Press.
First published 2007
6th printing 2013
Printed and bound in the United Kingdom by the MPG Books Group
A catalogue record for this publication is available from the British Library
ISBN 978-0-521-84901-2 Hardback
ISBN 978-0-521-61332-3 Paperback
Cambridge University Press has no responsibility for the persistence or accuracy of URLs for external or third-party internet websites referred to in this publication, and does not guarantee that any content on such websites is, or will remain, accurate or appropriate. Information regarding prices, travel timetables and other factual information given in this work are correct at the time of first printing but Cambridge University Press does not guarantee the accuracy of such information thereafter.
Contents
List of illustrations
List of maps
Preface
List of abbreviations
Introduction
Metamorphōsēs and this selection
Ovid’s life
Some features of this selection
Ovid’s gods
Women and woods
Amor and rape in Ovid
Ovid and epic
Irony and paradox
Style
Some assessments
After-life
Glossary of technical literary terms
Notes for the reader
Translating Ovid
Metre
Suggestions for further reading
Maps
Passages
1. Deucalion and Pyrrha, Metamorphōsēs 1.348–415
2. Cupid, Apollo and Daphne, Metamorphōsēs 1.452–567
3. Io (and Syrinx), Metamorphōsēs 1.583–746
4. Phaethon, Metamorphōsēs 2.150–216, 227–38, 260–71, 301–39
5. Diana and Actaeon, Metamorphōsēs 3.138–252
6. Juno and Semele, Metamorphōsēs 3.253–315
7. Tiresias, Metamorphōsēs 3.316–38
8. Echo and Narcissus, Metamorphōsēs 3.339–510
9. Pyramus and Thisbe, Metamorphōsēs 4.55–166
10. Arethusa, Metamorphōsēs 5.572–641
11. Minerva and Arachne, Metamorphōsēs 6.1–145
12. Cephalus and Procris, Metamorphōsēs 7.694–756, 796–862
13. Minos, Ariadne, Daedalus and Icarus, Metamorphōsēs 8.152–235
14. Baucis and Philemon, Metamorphōsēs 8.626–724
15. Byblis, Metamorphōsēs 9.517–665
16. Orpheus, Metamorphōsēs 10.8–63, 11.1–66
17. Pygmalion, Metamorphōsēs 10.243–97
18. Venus and Adonis, Metamorphōsēs 10.519–739
19. Midas, Metamorphōsēs 11.100–45
Total learning vocabulary
Grammar index
Illustrations
1 Francesco Mosca, ‘Diana and Actaeon’. Florence, Museo Nazionale del Bargello. Photo: author.
2 Picture of spinning on Ithaca. From A. B. Wace and F. H. Stubbings, A Companion to Homer (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1963), Plate 35(b).
3 Daedalus and Icarus. Wall-painting from Pompeii. A. S. Hollis (ed.), Ovid: Metamorphoses Book VIII (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1970), Plate IV.
4 Titian, Venus and Adonis. Derechos reservados © Museo Nacional del Prado – Madrid.
5 Rubens, Venus and Adonis. New York, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Gift of Harry Payne Bingham, 1937 (37.162). Photograph © 1983 The Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Maps
1 Mainland Greece
2 The Western Aegean and Asia Minor
3 The Central and Eastern Mediterranean
Preface
This selection of stories from Ovid’s Metamorphōsēs is designed for those who have completed a beginners’ course in Latin. Its purpose is restricted and unsophisticated: to help such users, who will have read little or no Ovid, to enjoy the story-telling, character-drawing and language of one of the world’s most delightful and influential poets. Assistance given with vocabulary and grammar is based on two widely used beginners’ courses, Reading Latin and Wheelock’s Latin (for details, see Vocabulary, grammar and notes below).
My general principle is to supply help on a need-to-know basis for the story in hand. The Vocabulary, grammar and notes and Learning vocabularies accompanying the text speak for themselves. The Comment at the end of each passage is an occasionally embellished paraphrase whose main purpose is to point up important detail and show how the logic of each story unfolds. I make no apology for this. With the minimal amount of time today’s students have for learning the language, the demands of translation alone can be so heavy that it is all too easy to miss the wood for the trees and hamper the whole purpose of the exercise – pleasure, one of the most useful things in the world. The Study sections offer ways of thinking further about the passage.
My debt to W. S. Anderson’s excellent Ovid’s Metamorphoses Books 1–5 (Norman and London: University of Oklahoma Press, 1997) and Ovid’s Metamorphoses Books 6–10 (Norman and London: University of Oklahoma Press, 1972) will be obvious. The translations by David Raeburn, Ovid: Metamorphoses: A New Verse Translation (Penguin Classics, 2004, brilliantly readable) and A. D. Melville, Ovid Metamorphoses (Oxford World’s Classics, 1986, with a first-rate Introduction by E. J. Kenney) made stimulating companions. Arthur Golding’s Ovid’s Metamorphoses (1565, used by Shakespeare, the spelling modernised for Penguin Classics, 2002) remains peerless.
My best thanks go to Andrew Morley for the maps.
Peter Jones
Newcastle upon Tyne, July 2005
Abbreviations
1f., 2m., etc. refer to the declension and gender of a noun
1/2/3/4 and 3/4 (which some
grammars call 5) refer to the conjugation of a verb
abl.
ablative
abs.
absolute
acc.
accusative
act.
active
adj.
adjective
adv.
adverb
cf.
cōnfer, ‘compare’
comp.
comparative
conj.
conjugation,
conjugated
dat.
dative
decl.
declension
dep.
deponent
dir.
direct
f.
feminine
fut.
future
gen.
genitive
imper.
imperative
impf./imperf.
imperfect
indecl.
indeclinable
ind.
indicative
indir.
indirect
inf.
infinitive
intrans.
intransitive
irr.
irregular
l(l)
line(s)
lit.
literally
m.
masculine
m./f.
masculine/feminine
neg.
negative
n.
neuter
nom.
nominative
part.
participle
pass.
passive
perf./pf.
perfect
pl.
plural
plupf./plup.
pluperfect
p.p.
principal part
prep.
preposition
pres.
present
prim.
primary
pron.
pronoun
q.
question
rel.
relative
s.
singular
sc.
scīlicet, ‘presumably’
sec.
secondary
seq.
sequence
sp.
speech
subj.
subjunctive
sup.
superlative
trans.
transitive
tr.
translate
vb.
verb
voc.
vocative
Introduction
Metamorphōsēs and this selection
Ovid’s roughly twelve-thousand-line, fifteen-book Metamorphōsēs (‘Changes of shape’) is classed as an epic (like all epics it was composed in hexameters). It offers a supposedly temporal sequence of myths that starts with the formation of the world and ends with Ovid’s contemporary, the emperor Augustus. Its title derives from the fact that almost all the stories involve transformations of one sort or another, about two hundred and fifty in all, mostly of humans. Ovid treats each one with inimitable brilliance, turning Metamorphōsēs into (if nothing else) a treasure-house of wonderful stories. But since these stories of transformation are all self-contained narratives, often without any obvious connection with each other, Ovid has to employ a range of ingenious devices in order to weave them together into a continuous narrative. As a result, Metamorphōsēs is quite unlike any other epic, and rather difficult to summarise. One (among many) ways of doing so is to divide it into three sections. In books 1–6 it recounts stories mainly of gods (e.g. Apollo and Daphne, Jupiter and Io, Jupiter’s rape of Europa, Dionysus and Pentheus, Mars and Venus); books 7–10 concentrate on the heroes of myth (e.g. Jason and the Argonauts, Medea, the Minotaur, the Calydonian boar, Hercules, Orpheus and Eurydice); and in books 11–15 Ovid turns to ‘history’ (the siege of Troy, the stories of Aeneas, Romulus and early Roman kings like Numa), before unfolding some lengthy ‘philosophical’ speculations on vegetarianism and the nature of change by the sixth-century BC Greek philosopher Pythagoras. With a positively phosphorescent temporal leap at the finish, the poem ends with the assassination of Julius Caesar and his transformation into a star, so that his adopted son and heir Augustus can be proclaimed offspring of a god. But this way of summarising the poem, like every other way, merely indicates the problems there are in trying to define what the poem is ‘about’, especially as no story, or sequence of stories, seems to be given special status over any other. In other words, as soon as one attempts to pin the poem down by means of e.g. an over-arching structure or dominant theme, it promptly wriggles free. Ovid clearly did not see this as a problem. Neither should we.
The stories in this selection represent about one-sixth of the whole. They have been selected primarily because each is (broadly) self-contained and has high entertainment value. As can be inferred from the summary above, they do not represent every side of Ovid’s vast poem (which is much longer than the Aeneid); in other words, there is more to Metamorphōsēs than this selection can suggest.
Herewith four caveats, all essential for understanding what this book, which is aimed at post-beginners, is trying and not trying to do:
This brief introduction is designed to apply only to the contents of this reader. It does not engage with all the problems or issues implicit in a bewilderingly kaleidoscopic work like Metamorphōsēs.
Ovid drew on many different sources for his tales. These are sometimes quoted in the Study sections, so that readers can reflect on how and why Ovid’s version differed. In general, where I attribute originality to Ovid, please preface my remarks with ‘If Ovid is not drawing this detail from his sources . . .’
Detailed analysis of the various genres of writing of which Ovid was master is inappropriate in a reader designed for those whose experience of Latin is limited. I have restricted comment here to a few aspects of epic as exemplified by Homer and Virgil and some references to Ovid’s earlier elegiac love-poetry. I recommend the following epic prose translations in the Penguin Classics series for their accessibility: Homer: The Iliad, tr. E. V. Rieu, rev. Peter Jones (Penguin Classics, 2003); Homer: The Odyssey, tr. E. V. Rieu, rev. D. C. H. Rieu (Penguin Classics, 2003); Virgil: The Aeneid, tr. David West (rev. edn., Penguin Classics, 2003). For Ovid’s love-poetry, see, e.g., Ovid: The Erotic Poems, tr. Peter Green (Penguin Classics, 1982) and Ovid: The Love Poems, tr. A. D. Melville (Oxford World’s Classics, 1990).
Where I attribute beliefs or attitudes to Ovid on the strength of what he writes, please preface my remarks with ‘Ovid writes as if he believes that . . .’
Ovid’s life
Publius Ovidius Naso (‘Nose’) was born on 20 March 43 BC in Sulmo (modern Sulmona in the Abruzzi, ninety miles east of Rome over the Apennines). It was the year after Julius Caesar had been assassinated. After another period of civil war, Caesar’s heir, Octavian, fought his way to sole power by defeating Mark Antony and his Egyptian lover Cleopatra at Actium in 31 BC (they committed suicide a year later) and in 27 BC became Rome’s first emperor, universally known as Augustus. During this period, Ovid’s wealthy parents were putting Ovid (he tell us, Trīstia 4.10), through a standard rhetorical education in Rome, designed to equip young Romans with the verbal skills needed to make a public career in prestigious and lucrative areas like politics or law (i.e. where one climbed the ladder by one’s ability to communicate persuasively). The elder Seneca tells us that Ovid excelled in the element of rhetorical training called suāsōria, an exercise in which the student had to advise a figure from legend or history on the course of action he should take, e.g. what would one say to Agamemnon when he was told that, if the Greek fleet were to sail for Troy, he had first to sacrifice his daughter Iphigeneia? Such training would stand Ovid in very good stead for all his work (his Hērōides (Heroines), for example, in which famous mythical women –
like Penelope, Medea, Dido, Phaedra – write impassioned letters to their men, and sometimes exchange letters with them). After this, Ovid travelled round Sicily and Greece (still regarded as the cultural hot-bed of the ancient world). Ovid’s parents presumably had in mind a career for him in some official capacity in public service, but a brief experience of minor judicial posts turned out not to be to Ovid’s taste, and he gave it all up to become a full-time poet. His father, apparently, disapproved.
There was strong competition in Rome at this time – Virgil (b. 70 BC: Ovid had seen him), Horace (b. 65 BC: Ovid had heard him give a reading), Tibullus (b. 55 BC: Ovid knew him), Propertius (b. 50 BC: a close friend of Ovid’s). But perhaps as early as the mid-twenties BC Ovid had made his mark with his Amōrēs, a selection of elegiac love-poetry in three (originally five) books. It was a stunning debut for one so young. Further slender elegiac volumes poured out, most controversially his light-hearted instruction manual Ars Amātōria in three books (how to get your girl/boy), soon to be followed by his Remedia Amōris (how to lose your girl/boy). All these books treat the subject-matter lightly, wittily and ironically – Ovid’s escapades in love have at times an almost soap-opera element to them – and parody and self-mockery are well to the fore. They also use myth extensively to illustrate the dilemmas of young lovers.
When it came to love, Ovid did not feel he had to stir his soul to its depths with a pole, as Tibullus and Propertius rather tended to. To give an example: in Amōrēs 3.2, Ovid imagines himself at the chariot-races with a woman he wants to sleep with. After admitting he couldn’t care less about the races but it’s a great place to be with the woman he’s after (various doubles entendres on ‘riding’), he presses up close to her (‘one advantage of the narrow seating’), picks up her dress (‘it’s trailing on the ground’) to admire her legs (just like Atalanta’s or Diana’s, he comments) and admits he’s feeling ‘hot’ (‘let me fan you – unless it’s just me’). Look! Some dust on your dress! Let me brush it off. Then the race starts. Ovid urges on his girl’s favourite, the crowd goes wild (‘hide your head in my cloak in case your hair gets spoiled’), the right chariot wins and
