Tempos houve em que tudo ligado à mitologia me parecia excessivo. Desde logo, a quantidade de figuras e as inúmeras versões atribuídas a cada uma. A intensidade dos amores e dos ódios! As manipulações! As vinganças! O sangue! A crueldade! Hoje, tudo me sabe a pouco!
Metamorfoses, carrega o peso inquestionável das grandes obras cuja grandeza resiste incólume ao passar do tempo. Entre este e As Núpcias de Cádmo e Harmonia de Roberto Calasso, o meu coração divide-se por igual, ambos merecem ser revisitados amiúde.

صدق أوفيد حين قال في خاتمة كتابه أن حتى غضبة جوبيتر الجبار لن تستطيع أن تمحو أثر كتابه وتعجز النار والحديد بل أنياب الزمن العاصف أن تطمس كلماته فكانت أصداء هذا الكتاب واضحة في كل الآداب العالمية وظل منبعاً تستقي منه الآداب الغربية الإلهام فنراه في ملحمة ملكة الجان لإدموند سبنسر ومسرحيتي "العاصفة" و"حلم ليلة منتصف الصيف" لشكسبير ونرى رائعة جيفري تشوسر "حكايات كانتربري" تأثرت إلى حد كبير بأوفيد. ولم يقتصر أثر هذا الكتاب على الأدب وحده وإنما ترك بصمته على الفنون التشكيلية فنجد لوحات "بيكاسو" تصور مشاهد من هذا الكتاب ونراه في تماثيل "بنفنوتو تشيلليني" و "باولو فيرونيزي".
تنقل أوفيد برشاقة ساحرة بين مختارات من الأساطير القديمة وخرافات اليونان والرومان وحضارات الشرق السابقة ومن التراث الشعبي الروماني نفسه. فيروي هذه القصص بأسلوب شعري ساحر قل أن تجد له مثيل حيث يمتع القارئ ويرسخ أسماء الآلهة والأبطال في ذهنه فيريحه من المعاناة التي يكابدها أثناء قراءته لتلك الأساطير في أماكن أخرى.

Souvent il s'approche, ses mains palpent son œuvre, ne sachant
si elle est de chair ou d'ivoire. Et il ne dit plus qu'elle est en ivoire ;
il lui donne des baisers, et pense qu'elle les lui rend ; il lui parle,
l'étreint, croit sentir ses doigts presser les membres qu'ils touchent
et craint que les bras ainsi serrés ne soient marqués de bleus.
Tantôt il lui dispense des caresses, tantôt lui offre des présents
appréciés par les filles : coquillages, beaux galets, petits oiseaux,
des fleurs de mille couleurs, des lis, des balles peintes
Il la pare aussi de vêtements, passe à ses doigts
des pierres précieuses et à son cou de longs colliers ;
il suspend des perles à ses oreilles, des chaînettes sur sa poitrine.
Tout lui sied ; et nue, elle ne paraît pas moins belle.
il l'appelle la compagne de sa couche, et la dépose, nuque inclinée,
sur un coussin de plumes, comme si elle allait y être sensible.


Ovide a recueilli ces contes, lors de son voyage d'étude en Grèce qui était d'usage chez les patriciens Romains, pour notre plus grand bonheur. C'est un excellent départ pour découvrir la mythologie.

welcome to...METAMARCHOSES.

this is another installment of project long classics, in which i read intimidating books in small chunks over the course of a month in order to achieve three goals: a) seem smart, b) make puns, and c) have an excuse to buy penguin clothbound classics.

this one is slightly different because i already own it. brag alert: my boyfriend bought me my copy of this book when we were on a date in a closed bookstore. best date ever.

anyway. i have no idea what this is about. it's divided into 15 books, so let's read half of one a day, shall we?


BOOK I, PART I
the GODS just MADE the WORLD and then FLOODED the HELL out of it. and the WRITING is BEAUTIFUL. i'm having so much fun already.


BOOK I, PART II
this part is mostly about really pretty girls catching the eye of gods and then being turned into trees and cows and stuff because of that bad luck.


BOOK II, PART I
since the dawn of time, when cars were chariots and dads were gods, teenage boys in media have been driving their fathers' rides without permission only to f*ck everything up immediately.


BOOK II, PART II
this section focuses on a variety of tattletale birds.


BOOK III, PART I
i did NOT know the tiresias tragic backstory (one time he was turned into a woman because he saw some snakes screwing and therefore was called on by jove and saturnia to settle who has more fun in bed and when he sided with jove and said women saturnia blinded him but then jove felt bad so he gave him the eternal gift of prophecy).


BOOK III, PART II
now we're getting to echo and narcissus. this is like the greco-roman greatest hits.


BOOK IV, PART I
taken aback to find the words "he clings to his misshapen ass" here.


BOOK IV, PART II
there's a girl walking around in a robe dripping blood wearing a live serpent as a belt throwing crazy-making snakes at people. and perseus is carrying medusa's head like a tote bag while he turns guys into mountains and saves fair maidens from sea monsters. this is in half of one chapter.


BOOK V, PART I
by and large a play by play of who hit who with a spear.


BOOK V, PART II
one of the most unforgivable crimes you could commit in the ancient world was being a tattletale. the phrase snitches get stitches has held true throughout time and space.


BOOK VI, PART I
we are never too busy for an exhaustive rundown of which people the gods have turned into which animals throughout time.


BOOK VI, PART II
i am a sister girl for life, but i am not sure i would kill my son and then cut him up and cook him and feed him to my traitor husband in order to avenge mine. revenge would definitely be had but i'm not convinced i would choose that specifically.


BOOK VII, PART I
oh how i love a witchy girl.


BOOK VII, PART II
this book is actually so interesting that i have to choose between 3+ jokes with every section. i hope you all appreciate my sacrifice.


BOOK VIII, PART I
i guess i don't know what i expected from the minotaur origin story, but it wasn't either "deeply disturbing" or "a straight line from the icarus sun incident."


BOOK VIII, PART II
this is so rich with detail that it's like, "a bunch of guys died in a boar incident. a woman sets a fire in vengeance. the fire kills a father. all the daughters of the father are super mournful and upset. diana turns all those girls into birds, except two. these two are hercules' wife and the future mother of one of the guys who pops out of the trojan horse."

and on top of all that i'm learning about stuff like "watch-geese." this is a perfect book.


BOOK IX, PART I
everybody has a name, a name from childhood, a name that's a reference to their dad, a name that's a reference to some kind of infidelity knowingly or unknowingly committed by their mom, and a nickname. this is fun and impossible!


BOOK IX, PART II
in most cases i think fleeing your homeland and literally starting a new city from scratch in order to escape someone who has an unrequited crush on you is a bit much. however, if that person is your sister...fair enough!


BOOK X, PART I
i know the whole orpheus and eurydice thing is supposed to be a great romance, as in he loved her too much to be able to turn his eye from her, but i think it's more of an illustration of the fact that men literally cannot listen.


BOOK X, PART II
tons of incest in this book. what is this, hbo?


BOOK XI, PART I
the fact that midas ASKED that everything he touched would turn to gold?? it's like if ella enchanted begged to be obedient before chasing lucinda all over kingdom come.


BOOK XI, PART II
at this point i'm ready to believe the gods are just looking for reasons to turn women into birds. call a goddess ugly: you're a bird now. sleep with a god: you're a bird now. don't sleep with a god: you're a bird now. have a talent: you're a bird now. witness morpheus dressed up like your husband's very wet ghost in order to tell you that he drowned via dream: you're a bird now. enough already!


BOOK XII, PART I
these guys are getting really creative with their choice of battle weapons.


BOOK XII, PART II
did not know they had crowbars in ancient times. (see above.)


BOOK XIII, PART I
i kind of love that ovid was like, oh, the legendary stories that would be the basis of the iliad and the odyssey? yeah. those are just chapters in my book.

Ho cominciato la lettura di Ovidio un po’ titubante, ma mi sono ricreduta subito. Catapultata fin da subito nella nascita del Cosmo il libro acquista subito un ritmo incalzante che non lascia respiro e mi sono ritrovata a divorarlo.
E davanti agli occhi rivedo Tritone con le spalle incrostate di conchiglie, Apollo che scorazza sul suo carro, Giove che insegue i suoi amori fra una trasformazione e l’altra, e le metamorfosi prendono vita.
Bernini deve aver letto necessariamente gli splendidi versi che Ovidio dedica ad Apollo e Dafne, l’inseguimento incalzante, la trasformazione dei piedi in radici, del busto in fusto, dei capelli in fronde. Neanche dopo la metamorfosi Apollo si arrende: l’alloro in cui Dafne si trasforma sarà sempre caro al dio e con le sue foglie si cingeranno le teste dei vittoriosi perché anche Dafne abbia gloria nel tempo.
Bellissimi i versi dedicati al rapimento di Europa, la voluttuosità della giovane al richiamo di Giove, trasformatosi in toro per raggirarla, acquista toni sensuali e delicati.
Gli dei sono come bambini: capricciosi, arroganti, invidiosi. La loro furia non ha limiti. La loro vendetta è tremenda. Gli umani ne subiscono le sorti, che chiamano destino.
Scopriamo Medusa, il mostro che pietrifica, scendiamo nell’Ade con Teseo a riprendere Arianna, piangiamo la sorte sventurata di Niobe per colpa della sua ubris , scopriamo come nacque il Giacinto e come il salice piangente, vediamo come un albero cambi il colore dei suoi frutti dal sangue versato di Piramo e Tisbe, corriamo con Atalanta e Ippomene, godiamo per l’amore di Pigmalione.
Ma i versi più belli e toccanti sono quelli che riguardano Narciso e il suo amore impossibile:
“s'innamora d'una chimera: corpo crede ciò che solo è ombra
Disteso a terra, contempla quelle due stelle che sono i suoi occhi,
i capelli degni di Bacco, degni persino di Apollo,
e le guance lisce, il collo d'avorio, la bellezza
della bocca, il rosa soffuso sul niveo candore,
e tutto quanto ammira è ciò che rende lui meraviglioso.
Desidera, ignorandolo, sé stesso, amante e oggetto amato,
mentre brama, si brama, e insieme accende ed arde.
Quante volte lancia inutili baci alla finzione della fonte!
Quante volte immerge in acqua le braccia per gettarle
intorno al collo che vede e che in acqua non si afferra!
Ignora ciò che vede, ma quel che vede l'infiamma
e proprio l'illusione che l'inganna eccita i suoi occhi.
Ingenuo, perché t'illudi d'afferrare un'immagine che fugge?
Ciò che brami non esiste; ciò che ami, se ti volti, lo perdi!
Quella che scorgi non è che il fantasma di una figura riflessa:
nulla ha di suo; con te venne e con te rimane;
con te se ne andrebbe, se ad andartene tu riuscissi
Ai colpi il petto si colora di un tenue rossore,
come accade alla mela che, candida su una faccia,
si accende di rosso sull'altra, o come all'uva
che in grappoli cangianti si vela di porpora quando matura…”

Ma è solo nell’ultimo libro che Ovidio svela il vero senso delle sue metamorfosi. L’universo è un divenire in un ciclo che sempre cambia senza sosta. Come le onde del mare che si rincorrono sulla riva, passano le stagioni, l’uomo cambia, cresce si trasforma e muore per tornare alla terra, l’anima trasmisgra in altra forma, sia essa animale, pianta o di nuovo uomo. Dobbiamo aver cura dunque di ciò che siamo, di quello che abbiamo intorno e del tempo che ci è concesso.
Una lettura splendida, piena e attualissima, nonostante l’età che porta.





















.

What a master piece. This is a great comglomeration of the old Greek myths along with the Roman myths of this time period. It is very sharp and whitty.
This translation is so good and easy to understand. I recommend this to all.

Un'opera maestosa.. immensa.. eterna!
Eterna così come aveva predetto lo stesso Ovidio e la sua è "un'eterna gloria" più che meritata!
È un poema epico immortale, summa della mitologia greco-romana, racconto corale e complesso, ma nonostante questo caratterizzato da una lettura scorrevole e mai noiosa.
Dalla narrazione della nascita del mondo si passa all'epoca del mito e di tutte le metamorfosi che caratterizzano questo periodo. Fino ad approdare all'età storica che inizia con gli eroi dell'Iliade e con Enea che cerca la sua meta finale nella fertile terra d'Ausonia. Da qui si arriva ai primi re di Roma, alla filosofia di Pitagora e, infine, alla glorificazione di Roma e del suo Divo più importante, Ottaviano Augusto della stirpe Iulia, chiudendo così il cerchio.
Ma, nonostante quest'opera magnifica ed imponente, la fine di Ovidio non sarà gloriosa come il suo poema.. infatti, finirà esiliato nella "barbara" e inospitale Tomi, città sul mar Nero, così come la definiva lo stesso poeta abituato alla cosmopolita e vitale Roma.
Per fortuna l'opera sarà conclusa prima del suo esilio nel 8 d.C., a differenza de I Fasti, e come Enea, Romolo e Cesare anche il nome di Ovidio diverrà immortale e la sua fama raggiungerà il firmamento.

What the fuck Ovid. Save some brilliance for the rest of us.

Not for me, but I can appreciate it for what it is.

This one's really a collection of stories with a similar theme: the many forms of change. Ovid's become my favourite ancient Greek/Roman poet. The best part of this is the beginning, the narrative catches the subtlety of creation with just the evolution of his word choices. The translator, Horace Gregory shows this with his English word choices.

Everything afterwards is fabulous! Each little story is told in such a way that it becomes part of a larger narrative that flows through time. As a whole, The Metamorphoses begins with the creation of the cosmos, travels through the lives of the various gods, into the human sphere and demi gods. The final book talks about time itself with that epic Epilogue. ^.^

Ovid's a genius! When you write this well, you can become anything you want!

I must, must read The Odyssey & The Aeneid this year. The sections that reduced Homer & Virgil's works into a mere 20 pages each read brilliantly, but to read their original epics will make Ovid's words resonate even more.

I read this about two months after my second stay in Rome in 2019, so sadly never had the book itself in the city. The city though, was of course, on my mind, throughout.

The Metamorphoses is an 8 AD Latin narrative poem which consists of 11,995 lines, 15 books and over 250 myths. It is known as one of the most influential works in Western Literature, influencing the likes of Dante, Shakespeare, Chaucer. It is accredited with having over 200 characters. My edition stands at over 700 pages long. Elements from the poem have been depicted throughout art forms for centuries. On a beach in St Ives, Cornwall, one year, I read Ted Hughes' Tales From Ovid, his brilliant retelling of twenty-four of the tales. (For a taster of the myths, it is certainly a good place to start, at only 250 pages.)



Most of the myths are familiar: Apollo and Daphne, Narcissus and Echo, the Rape of Proserpina, Arachne - Niobe, Medea and Jason, Theseus and Aegeus, Scylla and Minos, the Minotaur, Daedalus and Icarus, Hercules, Venus and Adonis, Orpheus and Eurydice, Midas, the Death of Achilles, the Ships of Aeneas, Ajax, the Fall of Troy, Ulysses and Circe, and countless more. It ends with the apotheosis of Julius Caesar.

The short prologue reads, and distinguishes the theme of the entire poem:
n  

Changes of shape, new forms, are the theme which my
spirit impels me
now to recite. Inspire me, O gods (it is you who have even transformed my art), and spin me a thread from the
world's beginning
down to my own lifetime, in one continuous poem.

n
Ovid says so himself; the art of transformation is the crux of this giant work. And it is true, we witness the Gods turning men into animals, stones, constellations. It is about love; it is violent; it is also witty, Ovid does not write without humour at times. I remember to this day the humour spinning from the absurdity of some of the events, made absurd by Ovid, who is always seemingly self-aware. At the end of "The Creation" in Book 1, from line 84, the first mention of a metamorphosis occurs, that of man:
n  

Where other animals walk on all four and look to the
ground,
man was given a towering head and commanded to stand
erect, with his face uplifted to gaze on the stars of heaven.
Thus clay, so lately no more than a crude and formless
substance,
was metamorphosed to assume the strange new figure of
Man.

n
Where Ovid calls Man "strange", Hughes, to compare, likens us to Gods:
n  

Then Prometheus
Gathered that fiery dust and slaked it
With the pure spring water,
And rolled it under his hands,
Pounded it, thumbed it, moulded it
Into a body shaped like that of a god.

n

"The Untangling of Chaos, or the Creation of the Four Elements", Hendrik Goltzius—1589

The gods are mischievous throughout. At times their actions seemed completely unprovoked, uncalled for, at other times, they were cruelly fair. Over the 250 myths we see gods and men fight, gods and gods fight, men v. man, heroes against creatures and gods, we see almost everything pitted against one another. And despite the humour, there are poignant moments of feeling, beauty and emotion.

Like in one of my many favourite passages in the poem, the fall of Icarus in Book 8:
n  

He ceased to follow his leader; he'd fallen in love with the sky,
and soared up higher and higher. The scorching rays of
the sun
grew closer and softened the fragrant wax which fastened
his plumage.
The wax dissolved; and as Icarus flapped his naked arms,
deprived of the wings which had caught the air that was
buoying them upwards,
'Father!' he shouted, again and again. But the boy and his
shouting
were drowned in the blue-green main which is called the
Icárian Sea.
His unhappy father, no longer a father, called out, 'Icarus!
Where are you, Icarus? Where on earth shall I find you?
Icarus!'
he kept crying. And then he caught sight of the wings in the
water.
Daedalus cursed the skill of his hands and buried his dear son's
corpse in a grave. The land where he lies is known as
Icária.

n

"Landscape with the Fall of Icarus", Pieter Bruegel the Elder—c. 1560
[Icarus' legs can be seen in the bottom right of the painting, protruding from the sea, surrounded by feathers.]

Or, in Book 10, Orpheus leading Eurydice from the Underworld, which has always been one of my favourite myths; Ovid tells it hauntingly:
n  

Not far to go now; the exit to earth and the light was
ahead!
But Orpheus was frightened his love was falling behind;
he was desperate
to see her. He turned, and at once she sank back into
the dark.
She stretched out her arms to him, struggled to feel his
hands in her own,
but all she was able to catch, poor soul, was the
yielding air.
And now, as she died for the second time, she never
complained
that her husband had failed her—what could she complain
of, except that he'd loved her?
She only uttered her last 'farewell', so faintly he hardly
could hear it, and then she was swept once more to the land
of the shadows.

n
And because I've somehow managed to avoid any of the metamorphoses in the book, the transformation of Daphne into a tree in Book 1:
n  

[...] She had hardly ended her prayer when a
heavy numbness
came over her body; her soft white bosom was ringed
in a layer
of bark, her hair was turned into foliage, her arms into
branches.
The feet that had run so nimbly were sunk into sluggish
roots;
her head was confined in a treetop; and all that remained
was her beauty.

n

"Apollo and Daphne", Gian Lorenzo Bernini—1622–1625
[This is one of my favourite statues ever, life-sized and made from marble. It is housed in the Galleria Borghese in Rome, which I have never seen. It is my priority, on my next trip to the city, to finally see the sculpture in person.]

Ovid's report of Achilles' death is short and intriguing in Book 12:
n  

So saying, he pointed the hero out, still hacking the
Trojans
down; then turning Paris' bow in the same direction
he guided an arrow with deadly aim at Achilles' heel.
If Priam, after the death of Hector, had cause for rejoicing,
this surely was it. So Achilles who'd vanquished the
mightiest heroes
was vanquished himself by a coward who'd stolen the wife
of his Greek host.
If he was destined to die at the hands of a woman in war,
he'd rather be cut down by the axe of Penthesilea.

n
(The most popular recent depiction of Achilles and the story of Troy is Madeline Miller's The Song of Achilles, which actually chooses to omit the concept of Achilles' heel as she used principally Homer's Iliad as her inspiration, where it is not mentioned as it is here in Ovid.)

I could continue quoting elements of the poem forever. The myths are immortal, of course, and this new verse translation by Raeburn is stunning: it is fresh, readable, but maintains a beautiful poetic voice. Hughes' retellings are also brilliant and I recommend them. I read them after Ovid's original, which I preferred, though it is a long-haul. Any lovers of myth should flock here. Ovid is witty, profound and above all, genius. Of the Roman texts I've read, studying Classical Civilisation in college, this is still the greatest to date.

The Metamorphoses are Ovid’s masterpiece and one of the literary monuments of Antiquity, alongside the Bible, Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey and Virgil’s Aeneid. As the title suggests, Ovid’s book is about change, transformation, mutation. Its scope is exceptionally ambitious, encyclopaedic even. It covers the whole of ancient mythology, from the creation of the world and the flood to the epic of Phaëton, from Jupiter’s rape of various nymphs to the abduction of Europa, from Narcissus in love with his own reflection to Perseus and Medusa, from the rape of Proserpina to Medea and Jason, from Theseus and the Minotaur to the fall of Icarus, from Meleäger and the Calydonian Boar to Byblis’ and Myrrha’s incestuous passions, from the works of Hercules to the doomed love of Orpheus and Eurydice in the underworld, from the desire of Venus for Adonis to King Midas turning everything into gold, from the shipwreck of Cëyx to the battle of the Centaurs and to the Trojan War, from the sufferings of Hecuba to the wanderings of Aeneas, from Ulysses in Polyphemus’ cave to Circe’s witchcraft, and last but not least, from Romulus down to Julius Caesar. In short, Ovid has it all figured out!

Ovid’s Metamorphoses, like Virgil’s Aeneid, was written under the reign of Augustus and both works are, in their way, a glorification of the Roman Empire. All prior tribulations of gods and men aim towards this apex of history, this ideal order of civilisation. But Virgil’s and Ovid’s ways are very different. While Virgil unfolds the story of Aeneas in a single grand narrative, taking inspiration from the Odyssey, Ovid seems to be jumping randomly from one legend to the next, sometimes arranged into a Russian doll structure, thus covering a vast body of material (several hundreds of tales borrowed mostly from Greek literature). Within this colourful poem, there is one obsessive idea: the metamorphose (other recurring themes are romantic passion and sexual obsession). In a way, Virgil and Ovid could be compared to the myth of Arachne, exposed in book 6: Virgil being the Minervean, elevated, distinguished bard and Ovid the Arachnean, careless, disorganised poet.

At first, it seems he has gathered together every legend where some magical transformation is involved (Jupiter turning himself into a white bull, Actaeon changed by Diana into a stag, and so on). But by the end of the epic, primarily through Pythagoras’ speech in book 15 (my fave section), we come to understand that Ovid has a sort of profound ontological idea in mind. His book illustrates some kind of Heraclitean world view, whereby everything is in constant transmutation and flux. In a way, while Virgil is putting forward a historical statement about the origins of Rome, placing everything in a genealogical line, Ovid suggests something much more unstable and uncertain. If Augustus’ Empire is the pinnacle of human history, the poem makes room for further transformations and alterations down the line — a non-dogmatic, almost modern vision of history. Ovid knows that the Augustinian Empire, like everything else under the moon, is condemned to decay and death. (Did this contribute to his later banishment to the Black Sea — see the fantastic Poems of Exile?) The only thing that will remain through time is, according to the Epilogue (15, 870 sqq.), the poem itself, a poem about growth, transformation, and degeneration.

Another surprising fact about the Metamorphoses, also in line with Ovid’s metaphysical view of an all changing universe, is the justification of vegetarianism in book 15: “What a heinous crime is committed when guts disappear inside a fellow-creature’s intestines” (15, 86-87). Indeed, if gods and men can mutate into animals, a meat-eating individual is in some way a barbaric cannibal or a sacrilegious god-eater. Note the similarities between Ovid’s pagan doctrine on this issue and modern religious practices based on the belief on reincarnation (Hinduism, Jainism, Buddhism). In a broader sense, this very much resonates with our contemporary concerns about animal suffering and climate change. (One last thing that resonates with me in that same book 15, during this present time of coronavirus global pandemic, is the mention of Aesculapius, the saviour of Rome during the plague.)

Ovid is always a delight to read, chiefly because his descriptions are still readable and to the point, often playful or emotional, and never shy away from graphic details, visceral or sexual. See, for instance, the gory wedding banquets at the beginning of book 5 and book 12 (possible influence to the “Red Wedding” in Game of Thrones). Also see the erotic and gruesome story of Tereus and Philomela (book 6) — incidentally a blueprint for Shakespeare’s Titus Andronicus (which is, in turn, a recipe for the episode of the “Frey Pies”, again in Game of Thrones!). Furthermore (considering that the little Latin I have ever known is gone forever), David Raeburn’s recent translation into English hexameters is extraordinarily readable and never draws the reader’s attention to itself.

The Metamorphoses have had an enormous influence on Western culture, not just on other Roman writers, such as Apuleius with his spicy Golden Ass. It has made a particular impression on numerous artists since the Renaissance. Think of Botticelli, of course. Think of Titian’s Poesie, ordered by King Felipe II of Spain. Think of Brueghel’s Landscape with the Fall of Icarus (from book 8). Think of the Pre-Raphaelites (see below the exquisite Echo and Narcissus by Waterhouse — from book 3). Think of countless references made by Dante, Montaigne, Cervantes or Shakespeare in their works. Case in point: Pyramus and Thisbe (book 4) is inserted within A Midsummer Night's Dream and is the inspiration of Romeo and Juliet; the affliction of Hecuba (book 13) is slotted into Hamlet; Prospero’s late speech in The Tempest is inspired by Medea’s speech (book 7). Think too of all the plays based on the myth of Pygmalion (e.g. the Broadway musical and the film version of My Fair Lady). Think of the popular sword-and-sandal movies such as Jason and the Argonauts. And think nowadays of all the bestsellers that borrow from Greco-Roman myths — most of which are to be found chiefly in the Metamorphoses — indirectly, J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter series, or more directly, Madeline Miller or Stephen Fry’s latest books.

In short, Ovid’s Metamorphoses is to Greco-Roman mythology more or less what Snorri Sturluson is to Norse myths. While Snorri is essential to understanding the culture of the Vikings, without some knowledge of Ovid’s book, it would be practically impossible to comprehend Mediterranean Antiquity and, indeed, Western culture.