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This book was converted from its physical edition to the digital format by a community of volunteers. You may find it for free on the web. Purchase of the Kindle edition includes wireless delivery. ... Read more

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Perhaps one of the most influential works ever written, "The Metamorphoses" is an epic and narrative poem by the Roman writer Ovid. Finished in 8 AD, this work, organized into fifteen books, combines a stunning arrangement of mythological tales that are masterfully connected by a theme of transformation, most often through love. Beginning with the world's creation, the poet utilizes unparalleled wit to describe the history of the world, incorporating the most commonly known Greek and Roman myths and legends of his time in a style both dramatic and mischievous. Ovid's often sensuous poems weave together the tales of Daedalus and Icarus, Pygmalion, Persueus and Andromeda, the Trojan War, and the deification of Augustus, frequently changing the human men and women into remarkable beings through magic that rivals the gods. The best known classical work to writers during the medieval period and influencing other great artists such as Shakespeare and Titian, "The Metamorphoses" is a work that will continue to endure and inspire throughout the ages. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (14)

Metamorphoses
Knowing the price and precise condition of the product is always a plus. In this case, it was provided and very helpful. It helped me determine exactly which item I was going to purchase. Price and condition play huge roles in the items I purchase. Metamorphoses (paperback) was in the exact condition as stated in the description for it. Also, I received it before the estimated arrival time. I am highly satisfied with Amazon, the item, and the sender.

Great translation
Love this translation of the Metamorphosis.Very readable, and the structure with section-specific comments at the beginning of the section, combined with a preamble plus endnotes and a glossary worked very well.

Metamorphoses: Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes

Title: Metamorphoses by Ovid

Pages: 416 (including literary introduction and criticism).

Time spent on the "to read" shelf: Around 4 or 5 years.

Days spent reading it: 2 weeks.

Why I read it: I had been reading a number of books that referred to Greek mythology, and specifically stories told by Ovid. So I thought I might appreciate this book.

Brief review: Metamorphoses was certainly a difficult book to read. Not that I was looking for easy, but it was challenging to pay attention to this epic poem. I found the difficulties in a few areas:

1. The narrator changed often. I almost never knew who specifically was telling the story, and sometimes I did not even know what story I was reading. It was so hard to follow. And sometimes there would be a story within a story, and then you'd come out of the one story, back to the "main story" and then eventually leave that story as well. I think this poem would be easier to read if one had an outline of the stories in it with them. I wonder if anyone has done that? A quick search on google reveals that indeed it has been done. Maybe I should have printed one out before I started reading!

2. The stories become a little repetitive. Love found. Love pined for. Love lost. Change lover/lovee into animal/plant/exotic object of your choice. It becomes a little redundant in my opinion. More flowers and trees were created in the midst of the tale than it took to print it.

3. The use of the gods names in Roman, not Greek. I realize Ovid was writing as a Roman, but I mostly know my Greek mythology with Greek names. I found it hard to equate the Roman name with the Greek name. Add to that the difficultly of using multiple names or odd descriptors for someone and the task of figuring out who is being talked about can be rough (son of _____ was very common, actually there's an appendix in the front of the book for all of these, it's a few pages long).

4. The concept of love in this poem is ridiculous. Love at first sight is not so much love as lust. And that's about the extent of how love is portrayed in this work. I wish Ovid had a better understanding of what true love really was. The love he describes is selfish, greedy, and superficial. Throughout this poem people do crazy things because they saw someone beautiful. Well get over it, and stop being crazy!

So it was hard to appreciate this poem. Am I glad I read it? Yeah, probably. Some of the scenes were actually interesting. Like when Ajax and Ulysses make speeches for who should receive Achilles armaments. That was a fun chapter, the insults were flying. But for the most part, it was difficult to read, more difficult to follow, and the return for me was not as great as the investment. This is probably a great poem to study in college, not so great to manhandle for fun.

Favorite quote: Ajax talking smack...
"I own that it is a mighty prize I strive for, but such a rival takes away the honor of it. It is no honor for Ajax to have gained a prize, however great, to which Ulysses has aspired. Already he has gained reward enough in this contest because, when conquered, he still can say he strove with me."

Stars: 2 out of 5.

Final Word: Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes!

Love Ovid
The best collection of Greco-Roman myths, period.

I also love the cover, Bernini's Apollo and Daphne is one of the greatest sculptures ever made, you can even see her fingers becoming branches and leaves.

Read lots of the myths in college
Loved it!Especially Dionysus and the Zeus myths.A lot of sexual stuff in it.Those early cultures had no shame! ... Read more

Product Description
"A version that has been long awaited, and likely to become the new standard."—Washington Post

Ovid's epic poem—whose theme of change has resonated throughout the ages—is one of the most important texts of Western imagination, an inspiration from Dante's times to the present day, when writers such as Salman Rushdie and Italo Calvino have found a living source in Ovid's work. Charles Martin combines a close fidelity to Ovid's text with verse that catches the speed and liveliness of the original. Martin's Metamorphoses will be the translation of choice for contemporary readers in English. This volume also includes endnotes and a glossary of people, places, and personifications. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (11)

Very Poor Translation
This translation of Ovid's Metamorphoses by Charles Martin is one of the poorest examples I've found.This was recomended by Robert Fagles (one of my favorite translators/poets), and the Washington Post says it will likely become the new standard.It also won the Harold Morton Landon Translation Award.What are these people reading?Is there another version of this translation out there?The Charles Martin translation that I read reduced one of the worlds most beautifull pieces of poetry to a silly puppet show.It's difficult by reading this to imagine that Martin has a commanding grasp of the Latin language, or maybe he's just a very poor writer.Either way, this book is not recommended to anyone for any reason.Try the Horace Gregory translation or wait with baited breath to see if Fagles will tackle this epic poem.Keep your fingers crossed and stay away from Martin.

A treasure of mythology
I read mythology very often, and recently read Ovid's metamorphoses. It is a vital part of the classical mythology canon.I highly recommend anyone interested in mythology, stories, or just great literature to read it.

Unpleasant surprises and no happy endings.
Publius Ovidius Naso was born in 43 B.C and died in 18 A.D.
He was banished for unknown reasons to Tomi, a barren place near the coast of the Black Sea. A few scholars believe that this was a literary hoax created by Ovid himself. It would enable him to write the 'Tristia' and 'Letters From The Black Sea'.
'Metamorphoses' is his main achievement. It contains 250 stories from the Greek Mythology and they all have in common that the principal character changes into another form. Most of the time they turn into an animal or a tree but also in a river, a constellation of stars, a rock or a flower and other pleasant surprises.

If you read this book you won't find many happy endings. The ancient Greeks didn't know the meaning of that expression.
It's not an easy read but if you persist it will be a rewarding literary experience.

Vivid and entertaining reading
First off, I'm not a scholar of Latin, nor of Ovid.I do speak another language, though, so I'm familiar with the problems of translations.That said, my impression of this translation is that it is a vivid and entertaining read.Many of the stories are familiar to any educated person, especially because they form the subject matter for many of the Western world's most famous paintings and sculptures.Martin makes the stories come alive, painting striking visual images with his words while gracefully preserving the rhythmic drive that seems to have been part of the original.And all this while translating from Latin, whose case-driven structure is quite different from English!It's impressive - and fun to read.

Greek myth
Heavy going - but then again isn't all greek tragedy- but a good unbiased translation.Great classroom text.You will need a good background in other greek myth to get the underlying story lines in some of the metamorphoses work.Greek tragedy never stands alone but builds. ... Read more

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Customer Reviews (14)

Wonderful!
I bought this book for a class and I have enjoyed it.A must read!

Well Done, Attractive Volume
Lovely cover, pleasant font type, fabulous translation, plenty of space in the margins.

Few will criticize the translation.Some readers may complain about Mandelbaum's lack of footnotes and introductory essay.Mandelbaum doesn't provide footnotes; he only gives what Ovid gives.If there were notes, the volume would be too bulky.It's already 550+ pages, and the translator does offer closing remarks (much more tasteful and appropriate than an introductory essay).I think the space in the margins is more important than editor's/translator's footnotes; that way, if a question arises, the reader can do his own research and annotate his copy beside the text for himself.

Excellent Translation
This translation really captures the humor of the poem-I got it for college english and have really enjoyed the read.

Excellent translation, but no annotations
Mandelbaum's translation of Ovid's Metamorphoses is the best I have seen so far. It is a very accurate and original rendition of the poem, while also being very readable. This is my most highly recommended edition of Ovid's Metamorphoses because of its highly readable, enjoyable verse translation. Mandelbaum, who won the National Book Reward for his classic verse translation of Virgil's Aeneid, displays his unmatched skill and heart at translating Latin classics in this edition of Ovid's poem.

My only complaint about this book is that the book does not have any footnotes or table of contents whatsoever. The book has to be navigated by looking at the top margins.

I personally do not recommend the Oxford and Penguin editions of this book, as they are not as close to the original Latin, and the rhetorical quality is also not as good. Focus Classical Library's edition of
Ovid's Metamorphoses is very highly annotated with indispendable footnotes, outlines, headings, and index, but unfortunately its translation complicated is not as readable as Mandelbaum's.

For serious mythology learners who want an accurate, original rendition of the poem, I would recommend getting both this book and Mandelbaum's translation. Because of the Focus Classical Library edition's indispensable annotations and more literal translation (which includes all of the proper names Ovid uses in his original poem) and outline, serious readers might want to also buy that one in addition to the Mandelbaum translation.

Overall, this is THE edition of Ovid's Metamorphoses that you should get, whether you are a new reader or longtime classicist. This vivid, accurate, readable, page-turning book is truly a modern masterpiece.

Good Mythology and a Strong Translation
Most mythology I have read has been in a prose format. Reading Ovid was a bit of a challenge but I found this translation much cleaner then several of the others I tried to read.

If you think by reading one mythology text you have already encountered everything you needed to know, you are of course wrong, I found new characters, new stories that I am weaving into my own writing.

I highly recommend this translation. ... Read more

Product Description
This is a modern translation of Ovid's Metamorphosis designed for readers interested in a close translation that reflects the poetic style and nuance of the original, but emphasizes through notes and the introduction the mythological themes of which the Metamorphosis has been such an influential work. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (32)

Kindle version is ugly
The publisher has strung together photo scans from the (excellent) print version of Melville's translation. Then stitched them together poorly, so that the margins of successive paragraphs only align by happenstance. The result is something like reading a kidnapper's pasted up ransom note. Very shoddy work.

Beloved Professor
This translation was written by Phil Ambrose, a former professor of mine at the University of Vermont. He was in the Classics Department and taught a very popular mythology class for many years. I am excited about having a translation of Ovid that he actually wrote! It is carefully written and true to the Latin, but perhaps not as easily to read for the general public as some of the other published translations out there.

amazing
I bought this book for my Mythic Contexts course at the university. The book is hard to get; you must order it. I know I couldn't find it anywhere else other than on amazon.com. It is a great book for anyone who appreciates fine literature. I will definitely read it over and over through for years to come. Enjoy poetry at its best. It is simply a pleasure to read it. Please, do buy it. It's worth it !!!!

The Translation Remains Vibrant and Modern
Humphries translation of the Latin classic of Greek and Roman mythology is still contemporary, fresh, vibrant, and colorful more than a half-century after first publication. For readers unfamiliar with Ovid, the great Latin poet and lover of Transformations (i.e., Metamorphoses), we are simultaneously acquainted with the great classical myths, given their contemporary meaning and perennial revelance, through a masterful translation that is as modern as the stories are classical. For example, from Book III, "Echo and Narcissus," we read:

Now Narcissus
Was sixteen years of age, and could be taken for
Either boy or man; and boys and girls
Both sought his love, but in that slender stripling
Was pride so fierce no boy, no girl, could touch him.

To understand the pantheon of the classical gods, each was a projection of one (or maybe two) human attributes is a quasi-human, quasi-divine form. Rather than trying to make a single god into a possessive, jealous, xenophobic, and emotionally-unstable, homophobic male patriarchical "prick," the pantheon of Roman and Greek gods were merely the "objectification" of the worst and noblest human emotions, intelligence, vulnerabilities, and jealousies -- just as we find in ourselves, without crusty theology to cloud the oracles of human vice and virtue (versus human depravity, sin, and redemption). This is a book one can enjoy in "sprints," or luxuriate with on a weekend afternoon, and further, enjoy reading to your Beloved. We do. With Humphries exquisite translation, hearing the poetry read makes it even livelier to the ear and heart.

Dazzling: No Wonder Shakespeare Loved It
This impressive relic of antiquity spans a wide panoply of themes, characters and situations. It's simply magnificent. Scholars have noted an opaque style in Metamorphoses, and someone reading commentary like this might believe this multifaceted poem is vacuous...ornamentation and little else. However, as I read A. D. Melville's glorious, if abstruse and demanding, translation, I feel I'm experiencing a wellspring of William Shakespeare--the material is that colorful and full of life. And of course I am, because when the Bard set off to write plays for his highly successful acting company, he grabbed Ovid's Metamorphoses; as many Shakespeare fans know, it had been assigned reading during his grammar school years.

Ovid's scenes are beautifully woven: the rhetorics and structures, usually borrowed from existing stories, are clever, and the characters live and breathe. Although the effects of the many cross-currents among god and mortal, creature and nature, etcetera are, at least superficially, those of wild fantasy and myth, examples of the poet's subtle-yet-overriding Logoi can be found in passages like Narcissus and Echo, Tiresias and Pyramus and Thisbe, where the action seems as much fated and rational as ridiculous. That is, Ovid employs artifice wherein one conceit mirrors and affects another (and yet another and another and so on) in clear, logical fashion. For example:

When Apollo wielded his bow, writes Ovid, "He drew two arrows of opposing power./ One shaft that rouses love and one that routs it." Or when describing anthropomorphic pathos of nature and earth, the artist suggests, "Then hungry nature lacking nourishment/ Will faint and, starving, starve her furnaces." This inspired language is masterfully rendered by Melville, who likes to end passages with rhymed couplets like: "And in its stead they found a flower--behold/ White petals clustered round a cup of gold!"

Unlike so many contemporary translators, Melville is after more than mere information and "accuracy" here. He's striving for fidelity to the original, Latin text vis-à-vis the reader's experience, and with the help of E. J. Kenney's useful--if too short--introduction and the book's copious endnotes, I feel the effort yields success. Compared with Mandelbaum's disappointing The Metamorphoses of Ovid, an overly bland and technical piece for someone who displayed such remarkable prowess in The Aeneid of Virgil (Bantam Classics), this Oxford edition transcends and entertains.

As it should, too, because Metamorphoses is great fun. So much so, it inspired a school-aged bard six centuries later.

My Titles
Shadow Fields
Snooker Glen
Dasha ... Read more

Product Description
Presents a selection of stories from Ovid's Metamorphoses, the most famous and influential 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 influential poets. The text is accompanied by full vocabulary and grammar notes, with assistance based on two widely used beginners' courses, Reading Latin and Wheelock's Latin. Essays at the end of each passage point up important detail and show how the logic of each story unfolds, while study sections offer questions for discussion and ways of thinking further about the passage. No other intermediate text is so carefully designed to make reading Ovid a pleasure. ... Read more

Product Description
This collection of Ovid's poems deals with the whole spectrum of sexual desire, ranging from deeply emotional declarations of eternal devotion to flippant arguments for promiscuity. In the "Amores", Ovid addresses himself in a series of elegies to Corinna, his beautiful, elusive mistress. The intimate and vulnerable nature of the poet revealed in these early poems vanishes in the notorious Art of Love, in which he provides a knowing and witty guide to sexual conquest - a work whose alleged obscenity led to Ovid's banishment from Rome in AD 8. This volume also includes the "Cures for Love", with instructions on how to terminate a love affair, and "On Facial Treatment for Ladies", an incomplete poem on the art of cosmetics. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (9)

My first introduction to Ovid

I am new to the works of Ovid and consider myself a beginning amateur enthusiast of Classical Roman works, not a scholar by any means.

For my purposes, I like this version for its direct, up-to-date style, not too archaic or wordy.

However, the image of Ovid as a sensual, racy guy who really loved women, clearly comes across.

The poems are not "graphic" in the modern sense; those looking for that type of literature should look elsewhere.

I do not know how close it is in shades of meaning to the original Latin or which other translations are more accurate in that regard.

I picked it up as one who was interested in finding out about Ovid and have found this to be an enjoyable introduction.

Nice translation, timeless poetry, historically important
The Erotic Poems form a set of social satires and commentaries by Ovid.They are important historically, and just poetically nice.One can see in them a lot of what the Romantic-era poets were trying to recreate.Yet the poems are remarkably timeless (I wasn't sure about the translations in a couple of points, but these were minor) and speak to our age as much as Ovid's.

As a departure from my usual style, I will leave the historical importance of these works to other reviewers except to note that they are important.The translation is sufficient to give the work 5 stars.

However, one may well ask why someone who is not a historian or classicist might want to read this work.The simple reason here is that the works speak of sexual desire (and love too in some cases) in ways which are fundamentally timeless, in eloquent style, and in vivid imagery.The works thus can help us understand those elements of ourselves which remain unchanged in two thousand years and help put these elements in our lives into a greater context.

I would highly recommend this work to everyone.

The Banned Poet
Ovid was banished into exile for writing "Art of Love", which is included in this book. It's a sort of versified manual for getting girls and getting "laid" (or to put it more delicately, love-making), full of witty and wise insight. These long poems will stir up romantic feelings inside you. Very worth it. Recommended to readers of Sappho.

David Rehak
author of "Poems From My Bleeding Heart"

Love, Sex and Guns: A Summary of The Amores, by Ovid
The Amores, by Publius Ovidius Naso, will leave your loins on fire and your heart as cold as ice.Coming from a time of Roman warriors and Greek gods, Publius Ovidius Naso, better known as Ovid, set the world and its many women on fire.With his mentions of charm and perfect bodies, he captures his audiences' hormones, as well as their imaginations.In The Amores, Ovid expresses sexual reminiscences of a woman named Corrina who may just as well be fictional.He tells us of her beautiful long hair and the body she possesses that is nothing short of perfect.Ovid shares with us his analysis of love as well as life.

Review: Ovid's Amores
Review: Ovid's Amores
The three books of Ovid's Amores depict a mockery of the values held during the first century of the Christian era.Ovid attempts to show the world the lack of importance in the great virtues presented in many of the major epics of the time.Amores uses satire to describe the author's wooing of women to waging war.It suggests that Ovid's efforts to romance his lovers are much more essential to life than the battles that are taking place during the time period.In that, he proposes that one should live for the day.Duty and valor are all pointless in the end.These ideas were of course very unpopular with the emperor Augustus.After the writing of one of his works the emperor banished Ovid from Rome.
Ovid was a Roman elegist who expressed a carpe diem attitude during a time where duty and honor were more valuable than life itself.He was born Publius Ovidus Naso in the town of Sulmo (now called Sulmona), near Rome in the year 43 BC.He was a highly educated man, originally skilled in the art of law.However, his passion was for literature and he spent a great deal of his time writing his own works rather than studying the past.His poetry of love probably stems from his own relationships, for by the age of 30 he had married three times and was divorced twice, with rumors of affairs.He lived an extravagant life and was well-it respected by the people of Rome.This high profile Roman life lasted until approached the age of50 when he was banished from Rome by Augustus.The reasons behind the banishment are unclear.Some say it is a result of a disapproval by Augustus of Ovid's work while others say that Ovid knew too much of a scandal that involved the emperor's daughter Julia.He was exiled to Tomi, in the Roman province of Dacia, and although he never lost his citizenship, he never returned to Rome and died in Tomi in the 17 AD.
Ovid's works can be categorized into three periods: his early works, his middle works, and the works written after his exile from Rome.His works, in contrast to popular works of the time such as Vergil's Aenied, are sharp in contrast.Although his ideas ran contrary to the beliefs of the time, Ovid was extremely popular in Rome.Amores was written in his early period, when the focus of his writings was on love.His middle works concentrate more on mythology and creationism, while his latter works, those written after his exile, have a depressing and bitter tone.He is said to have influence many English writers, including William Shakespeare and John Milton, and was one of the Roman poets with a tremendous impact on the writers of both the Middle Age and Renaissance periods.
During this time period in Rome the emperor Augustus favored and promoted the ideas of honor and duty.Those loyal to Rome were expected to embrace these values without question.Because of this writers such as Vergil gained much approval with the emperor.Their writings embraced these ideas and even portrayed them as being greater than love.Ovid's style and theme in Amores as with most of his writings favors a less dutiful attitude toward life.
Ovid's Amores also known as The Erotic Poems describes the poet's love affair with a woman named Corinna.In a series of three books Ovid depicts the phases of his relationship.He starts buy telling us how he came to write about love, and his encounter with cupid.(...)Corinna becomes the target of Ovid's love.During an afternoon he tells us of a rendezvous experienced with his new found love and spares little detail.As Ovid goes through his tale of love with Corinna he describes many experiences with her that begin to change from beginning to end.Ovid begins comparing his love affair and love in general to the efforts of war.(...) Here we see his analogy of war with love.When Carinna locks Ovid out during the writing of an epic he explains the unimportance of his work. (...)Ovid explains how his words are more effective then the strongest weapons.Poetry can open the doors of any young girl.Ovid's message is clear throughout Amores.Things such as duty and honor should not be worried about.One must live for the moment.

(...) ... Read more

Product Description
In the twenty-one poems of the "Heroides", Ovid gave voice to the heroines and heroes of epic and myth. These deeply moving literary epistles reveal the happiness and torment of love, as the writers tell of their pain at separation, forgiveness of infidelity or anger at betrayal. The faithful Penelope wonders at the suspiciously long absence of Ulysses, while Dido bitterly reproaches Aeneas for too eagerly leaving her bed to follow his destiny, and Sappho the only historical figure portrayed here describes her passion for the cruelly rejecting Phaon. In the poetic letters between Paris and Helen the lovers seem oblivious to the tragedy prophesied for them, while in another exchange the youthful Leander asserts his foolhardy eagerness to risk his life to be with his beloved Hero. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (2)

Mythology becomes real.
Publius Ovidius Naso was born in 43 B.C. and died in 18 A.D.
Emperor Augustus banished him - for unknown reasons - to Tomi ( a barren place near the coast of the Black Sea ). A few scholars believe that this was a literary hoax created by Ovidius himself.
With 'Heroides' ( Legendary Women ) Ovidius goes against the tradition where only men were allowed to complain in literary fiction about their ill fortune and human cruelty.
These women are all characters from the greek mythology like Briseis (Trojan war), Hermione the daughter of Helen and even Sappho as heroine in the legend where she commits suicide by jumping from a cliff into the sea.

Ovidius turned these women from rather abstract mythological characters into 'real' persons who could be recognized as such by the audience or the readers of Ovidius' work

very interesting book, but.....
I recommend this interesting book for everyone who is intersted in the "classical Greek & Roman world".However, I prefer to read it in the original Latin texts. And if you don't read the ancient Latin language well, I suggest you to read a volume(no.225) of the Loeb Classical Library. ... Read more

Product Description
A powerful version of the Latin classic by England's late Poet Laureate, now in paperback.When it was published in 1997, Tales from Ovid was immediately recognized as a classic in its own right, as the best rering of Ovid in generations, and as a major book in Ted Hughes's oeuvre. The Metamorphoses of Ovid stands with the works of Homer, Virgil, Dante, and Milton as a classic of world poetry; Hughes translated twenty-four of its stories with great power and directness. The result is the liveliest twentieth-century version of the classic, at once a delight for the Latinist and an appealing introduction to Ovid for the general reader.
Amazon.com Review
England's poet laureate Ted Hughes first turned his hand toOvid's Metamorphoses whenhe--along with other prominent English-language poets such as Seamus Heaney,AmyClampitt, and CharlesSimic--contributed poems to the anthology After Ovid. Inthe three years following After Ovid's publication, Hughescontinued working with the Metamorphoses, eventually completingthe 24 translations collected here. Culling from 250 original tales,Hughes has chosen some of the most violent and disturbing narrativesOvid wrote, including the stories of Echo and Narcissus, Bacchus andPentheus, and Semele's rape by Jove. Classical purists may be offendedat the occasional liberties Hughes takes with Ovid's words, but no onewill quarrel with the force and originality of Hughes's verse, or withits narrative skill. This translation is an unusual triumph--a workinformed by the passion and wit of Ovid, yet suffused with Hughes'sown distinctive poetic sensibility. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (15)

Great selections. Excellent translation
The 24 selections of Ovid's Metamorphoses that Ted Hughes translated is so modern and orginal, after reading Tales from Ovid by Ovid, Ted Hughes, I wish Hughes had translated the entire epic.

Hughes is a brilliant poet and the way he wield words dazzled me for hours:

Then Narcissus wept into the pool.
His tears shattered the still shrine
And his image blurred.
He cried after it: "Don't leave me.
If I cannot touch you at least let me see you.
Let me nourish my starving, luckless love-
If only by looking".

Beautiful, huh?

Stories Fading into Oblivion
I agree with most of the positive reviewers of this book, in fact, it's a wonderful book. It's 24 or 25 freely translated, modernized Greek myths in their Ovidian versions, out of 250 or so that Ovid wrote. In the introduction, Hughes said that the stories had become part of our culture's subconscious memory, and it occured to me that that may no longer be true, and that Hughes' work of preservation here and in his anthologies of poetry had a certain touching hopefulness to it. These are great stories with implications way beyond their obvious meanings. The great enemy of mankind's future, it seems to me, and as many other people have said, is Corporate Mankind: the unpoetic, the emotionally deaf, unmusical person, greedy and mendacious. Man becoming a kind of technologically sophisticated, highly organized human insect.Anyway, Hughes was one of the people who hoped this was not our fate and who tried to do something about it. This book was one of the ways, probably the most delightful, engaging of his efforts. His versions of these myths could not be improved upon.

Re:Yeah Man
To answer bayoubill's question regarding this book: "When will he translate the rest of the Metamorphoses? The Odyssey?"While that would have been great to see, Ted Hughes died about a year after the publication of Tales from Ovid.Ted's dead, bayoubill. Ted's dead.

By the way, excellent translation.Those who want to move on to read the Metamorphoses in its entirety would do well to read the 2003 Charles Martin translation, which is also excellent.

Yeah man
It makes love to your mind.When will he translate the rest of the Metamorphoses?The Odyssey?Go Ted, go.

brilliant stuff
As an appropriation of an appropriation, hughes' manages to bring to life the classic tales of greek mythology and modernize ovid's original tales yet at the same time keeping up the essential message that ovid was bringing across 2000 years ago. Even if you do'nt speak English one could understand teh works of hughes' perfectly, his range of vocabulary is genius in itself. the language slips and slides around your mouth, burning like brimstone or as languid as lagoons.
try this for size:

Violence is an extrapolation
Of the cutting edge
Into the orbit of the smile

Rivers of milk mingled with rivers of nectar
and out of the black oak oozed amber honey

I must confess I have to read this for my literature course, but I am so glad that I did! I never would have picked it up otherwise, whilst seemingly sophisticated and slippery it is simultaneously so simple and easy to relate to in a way that hardly condescends or patronizes the reader's understanding.
I strongly recommend this book to anyone, even if you don't speak english, even if you don't understand some of the words, it's the way it sounds that counts.
Read it with your eyes closed, you will never want to put it down. ... Read more

Product Description
Metamorphoses--the best-known poem by one of the wittiest poets of classical antiquity--takes as its theme change and transformation, as illustrated by Greco-Roman myth and legend.Melville's new translation reproduces the grace and fluency of Ovid's style, and its modern idiom offers a fresh understanding of Ovid's unique and elusive vision of reality. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (4)

Ovid's Metamorphoses
Ovid made a bold stab at the end of this book when he declares "wherever Rome's power extends over the conquered world, I shall have mention on men's lips, and, if the prophecies of bards have any truth, through all the ages shall I live in fame." I couldn't help but laugh at the audacity. But from an objective standpoint, he was entirely right. And after reading his book, I loved his writing so much that I agree that he should have that "undying name." I'm glad he knew something of his greatness before he died (even though he was exiled).

I suppose it's hard for me to give a review of an ancient text. What am I supposed to criticize? He uses too many Greek names I can't pronounce that sometimes differ in one letter or none? He sucks up to Augustus quite obviously, though perhaps in a sarcastic way? All fair enough for the times. Ovid's writing, of course, is poetic. He was a poet. His characters are never dull - even the ones that would go down in mythology as some of the least deserving of sympathy he turns into humans we can relate to. Scylla (not the one turned into the monster) has a passionate monologue revealing her struggle over helping her love, Minos, or saving her father's kingdom. Eventually she cuts her father's purple lock of hair, thus destroying his kingdom and ending his life. How could someone sympathize with that? But Ovid gives her a voice that shows her inner conflict, and the small, sometimes seemingly logical, steps people take to bad decisions. And he does this for many other characters.

He doesn't always portray the gods in a sympathetic light. He knew they could be jerks, and he went through no pains to hide this view. But sometimes he sounds pious enough so that you can understand the reverence with which the Greeks and Romans looked upon their gods. He covers pretty much all extremes of religious devotion - his stories show the most impious and pious, describe rituals, etc. Those, along with other phrases or sentences when you read carefully, reveal so much about the times and the culture, even beyond the religious field.

Considering this is a book of transformations, it provides stories to explain how many things came to be - the Sahara desert, different seasons, amber, the hyacinth, the woodpecker, etc. I always found that interesting about myths. If myths were often used as a teaching tool, explaining the existence of something would be one key function. And that element is always fun to read about.


Anyway, just read the book. It's worth it. He's one of the authoritative authors for occidental myths. No modern source could beat the value of an ancient author. If you don't have the patience to read the whole thing - I'll admit, it seemed to take forever to finish, but I was determined - get a book with an index, like this version. This has an excellent index and glossary, and the table of contents breaks the original books into the stories contained within them. It's formatted in a great way for reference later. It also has a lined, not prose, format, which preserves some of the authenticity and helps break up parts that would have turned into dense paragraphs in a prose style. I should confess, though, that this was not the translation I used for my cover-to-cover reading: my Latin teacher says that Mandelbaum's is the best, but I was stuck with a Barnes & Noble classics edition. Since then I've used this version as reference and to refresh my memory, but I can't completely comment on accuracy or readability.

I think this book should be a basic part of education, certainly if you have any interest in myths or the classics.

Not formatted for Kindle
I had already had a trying day and was looking forward to sitting and reading Ovid on my Kindle.I took quite a bit of time to decide that this Melville translation was the one I wanted.So it came as an unpleasant surprise that this edition is not properly formatted for the Kindle.No matter how you adjust the font size, you will not be able to get the line breaks to occur as Melville intended them to.If you use larger type, it simply looks like a prose translation.In a smaller font, the line breaks are generally in the wrong place.In short, don't waste your seven bucks as I have, if proper poetic form -- rhythm -- matters to you.

Through no fault of Ovid or Melville this Kindle book is not much use.And, by the way, as others have noted in several places, Amazon needs to grasp that a review of a translated work has to be listed so that it is translation specific, rather than the chaotic hodgepodge that currently exists.

God awful in comparison to so many others!
This is perhaps the worst translation of Ovid's Metamorphoses I've ever read!

Melville renders it into Verse, but all the sentences are jumbled and don't make sense, as well, he adds a weird type of archaic-ness throughout.It doen't make for easy reading or enjoyable reading either.
I'd rather read Arthus Golding's translation to be quite honest!

I think the best version on the market in Verse is Allen Mandelbaum's, and the best Prose translation being the incredible version by Mary Innes

The best $9 I ever spent
This book was a pure joy to read. While I didn't pick up on all the uproarious humor it's said to contain, each of the stories was very enjoyable. ... Read more

Product Description
In his award-winning translation, Charles Martin combines fidelity to Ovid’s text with verse that catches the speed and liveliness of the original.Ovid’s epic poem—whose theme of change has resonated throughout the ages—is one of the most important texts of Western imagination, an inspiration from Dante’s time to the present, when writers such as Salman Rushdie and Italo Calvino have found a living source in Ovid’s work. The text is accompanied by a preface, A Note on the Translation, and detailed explanatory annotations.

“Sources and Backgrounds” includes Seneca’s inspired commentary on Ovid, Charles Martin’s essay on the ways in which pantomimic dancing—an art form popular in Ovid’s time—may have been the model for Metamorphoses, as well as related works by Virgil, Callimachus, Hesiod, and Lucretius, among others.

From the enormous body of scholarly writing on Metamorphoses, Charles Martin has chosen six major interpretations by Bernard Knox, J. R. R. Mackail, Norman O. Brown, Italo Calvino, Frederick Ahl, and Diane Middlebrook.

A Glossary of Persons, Places, and Personifications in the Metamorphoses and a Chronology and Selected Bibliography are also included.

... Read more

Product Description
In the first century a.d., Ovid, author of the groundbreaking epic poem Metamorphoses, came under severe criticism for The Art of Love, which playfully instructed women in the art of seduction and men in the skills essential for mastering the art of romantic conquest. In this remarkable translation, James Michie breathes new life into the notorious Roman’s mock-didactic elegy. In lyrical, irreverent English, he reveals love’s timeless dilemmas and Ovid’s enduring brilliance as both poet and cultural critic. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (8)

gift
This was a gift and they loved it.It was listed on their Amazon wish list.

The Art of Love
It was not waht I expected but it is detailed enough to understand the content.I appreciate it considering when was was written.

Just have fun with it.
A seemingly tongue-in-cheek imitation didactic poem on seduction and love-making. The poem reads like an instruction manual, but Ovid uses the form of a love poem and numerous digressions to enhance the humour. However, he does make some strong points about how both sexes use deception in courtship (a woman's pleasure adds to the overall enjoyment of love-making, etc.) making one think that he wanted to educate while deflecting criticism by taking the humourous approach. It didn't work, apparently, as he was soon aftewards exiled.

Regarding James Michie's translation - this is an excellent form for this work. The translation respects the form of the original poem without adhering so strictly as to loose the free-wheeling fun of the message.A highly desirable English edition of this ancient work.

And there is nothing new under the sun...
Or at least, put it in a very positive way, that's what the smile on my face meant when I finished reading this beautiful piece written by Ovid during the first century A.D.; perhaps the "step by step" seduction handbook then and now, is even more remarkable by the fact that its wisdom applies the same in today's "complex" world.

The Art of Love or "Ars Amatoria" is no doubt the result of the life of a very well traveled and educated man, for he is one of those few who understands the ways (and mistery) of the feminine soul... by the same token, Ovid gives us both sides of the coin in this Roman's elegy: the ways of the male spirit in order to seduce women, and the step by step guide for women to seduce and keep men... in other words, there's nothing new under the sun, BUT, the ways we perceive and apply knowledge...

The love: the most coveted pearl!
Jim Capaldi was over inspired when wrote in the last strophe of his most emblematic theme: "Cause love is the high, high you can reach."

For all those people who have had the chance, the lucky and the fortune to get their couple and for the rest of them who never had the chance to construct a life's project with that special being, this text presents some clever observations about how the love must be cultivated, far from being imposed or begged.

The love, its implications, consequences and daily cares demand a virtue far beyond the patience is like a smart device of action and reaction that requires a wise flexibility, tolerance and profound knowledge of the human soul;"to think about us before myself" is a minuscule part of a complex web of feelings and personal livings of every member of the couple.

Don't let this classic book pass in front of you and acquire it as soon as you can.
... Read more

Product Description
A Latin textbook with readings from Ovid's "Metamorphoses." ... Read more

Customer Reviews (20)

Latin via Ovid Translations
This might be of some use to people studying Latin using the Latin via Ovid textbook!

[...]

PREVIEW:
Chapter One - Geographical Map

Here is a geographical map. The map is small, but the lands are large. The map is good. Europe and Africa and Asia are continents. The lands are beautiful in Europe, in Africa, in Asia.
Look at the lands in Europe. Britain, Gaul, Germany, Spain, Italy, Greece are in Europe. Look at the islands: Sicily, Sardinia, Corsica, Crete, Cyprus. Where are the islands? They are in the Mediterranean sea. Are the islands large? Yes, the islands are large. The Peloponnesus is a peninsula. Spain, Greece, Italy are large peninsulas. Rome is in Italy.
Look at Africa. Look at the lands in Africa: Mauritius, Numidia, Libya, Ethiopia, Egypt. Carthage is in Africa. In Dido Africa, the Phoenician queen lived and ruled.
Look at Asia. Look at the lands in Asia. The lands in Asia are Asia Minor, Armenia, Mesopotamia, Arabia, Syria, Phoenicia. Look at the small island of Phoenicia. The island is small - Tyrus. Europa, the girl in the first story, she lives in Phoenicia. Is the island large? The island is not large; it is small.

VISIT OUR WEBSITE FOR COMPLETE TRANSLATIONS OF THE LATIN VIA OVID BOOK!
[...]

Title... ;-)
I've been meaning to learn Latin for a long time.This book is very good; it's clear and concise.I acquired the CDs from my local library, and am using this book in conjunction with that, which I love.It's easy to do, and the lessons are short enough that I can fit one in at various times in the day.

Wonderful book for new Latin students
This book is great. It gave my child a head start in her high school Latin class.

WWW.LATINVIAOVID.WEBS.COM : Latin Translations for the entire book!
[...]

LATIN VIA OVID
Chapter One: Geographical Map

Here is a geographical map. The map is small, but the lands are large. The map is good. Europe and Africa and Asia are continents. The lands are beautiful in Europe, in Africa, in Asia.
Look at the lands in Europe. Britain, Gaul, Germany, Spain, Italy, Greece are in Europe. Look at the islands: Sicily, Sardinia, Corsica, Crete, Cyprus. Where are the islands? They are in the Mediterranean sea. Are the islands large? Yes, the islands are large. The Peloponnesus is a peninsula. Spain, Greece, Italy are large peninsulas. Rome is in Italy.
Look at Africa. Look at the lands in Africa: Mauritius, Numidia, Libya, Ethiopia, Egypt. Carthage is in Africa. In Dido Africa, the Phoenician queen lived and ruled.
Look at Asia. Look at the lands in Asia. The lands in Asia are Asia Minor, Armenia, Mesopotamia, Arabia, Syria, Phoenicia. Look at the small island of Phoenicia. The island is small - Tyrus. Europa, the girl in the first story, she lives in Phoenicia. Is the island large? The island is not large; it is small.

[...]

Great selections, but answers would be helpful
I love the selections from Ovid in this book! I like the slow start, using words very similar to their English equivalents, and the series of exercises that follow the selection. I even enjoy the discussion of etymology at the ends of the chapters.
My only complaint is the lack of answers at the back for the exercises. I'm trying to learn Latin on my own, and having the help of seeing answers would make my task somewhat less daunting. Still, taking enough care, and looking back at the examples and reading excerpt, I think I'll learn Latin well enough to read it on my own. Eventually. ... Read more

Product Description
Ovid's Metamorphoses gains its ideal twenty-first-century herald in Stanley Lombardo's bracing translation of a wellspring of Western art and literature that is too often treated, even by poets, as a mere vehicle for the scores of myths it recasts and transmits rather than as a unified work of art with epic-scale ambitions of its own. Such misconceptions are unlikely to survive a reading of Lombardo's rendering, which vividly mirrors the brutality, sadness, comedy, irony, tenderness, and eeriness of Ovid's vast world as well as the poem s effortless pacing. Under Lombardo's spell, neither Argus nor anyone else need fear nodding off.

The translation is accompanied by an exhilarating Introduction by W. R. Johnson that unweaves and reweaves many of the poem s most important themes while showing how the poet achieves some of his most brilliant effects.

An analytical table of contents, a catalog of transformations, and a glossary are also included. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (2)

a few words to the...well, a few words.
I just wanted to let the interested (particularly the beginning or intermediate student of Latin) know that, while this is a fantastic edition of Books 1-5 and probably by far the most in-depth commentary available for them, it is not marked (i.e., no macra). Additionally, the Latin text of the Metamorphoses and the line-by-line commentary are entirely separate, so the frequent flipping back and forth can begin to feel cumbersome at times. These things said, I do recommend Anderson's commentary to anyone who desires a brilliant, scholarly light to be shed upon Ovid's Metamorphoses; just be aware that this commentary cannot, as Pharr's Aeneid can, be used in lieu of serious attention to the language and a liberal amount of elbow grease.

Extremely Helpful Commentary
This commentary on Ovid's Metamorphoses is directed at Latin students at the advanced undergraduate and early graduate level, but it also has a lot to offer to scholars and other people who are able to read and enjoy Ovid's original Latin. Written by one of the most distinguished experts in the field, the Latin text of the book follows that of Anderson's own Teubner edition (6.ed. 1993). The commentary reflects Anderson's deep familiarity with Ovid's poetry and his high critical acumen. For a more detailed and highly positive review, see, e.g., Stephen Wheeler in American Journal of Philology 120 (1999) 170-73.

(...) ... Read more

Product Description

Ovid (Publius Ovidius Naso, 43 BCE–17 CE), born at Sulmo, studied rhetoric and law at Rome. Later he did considerable public service there, and otherwise devoted himself to poetry and to society. Famous at first, he offended the emperor Augustus by his Ars Amatoria, and was banished because of this work and some other reason unknown to us, and dwelt in the cold and primitive town of Tomis on the Black Sea. He continued writing poetry, a kindly man, leading a temperate life. He died in exile.

Ovid's main surviving works are the Metamorphoses, a source of inspiration to artists and poets including Chaucer and Shakespeare; the Fasti, a poetic treatment of the Roman year of which Ovid finished only half; the Amores, love poems; the Ars Amatoria, not moral but clever and in parts beautiful; Heroides, fictitious love letters by legendary women to absent husbands; and the dismal works written in exile: the Tristia, appeals to persons including his wife and also the emperor; and similar Epistulae ex Ponto. Poetry came naturally to Ovid, who at his best is lively, graphic and lucid.

The Loeb Classical Library edition of Ovid is in six volumes.

Customer Reviews (5)

"My Mind is Bent to Tell of Bodies Changed"
As someone uninvolved in the study of antiquities, nor assigned them for a course, it bears mentioning that I chose 'The Metamorphoses' specifically because it has been an inspiration to so much of the world's literature, and that, after reading, I hoped to have a better chance at recognizing and appreciating references to the source material in modern texts.I expected a difficult task, deciphering writing in the style of the King James Bible or Sir Walter Scott's 'The Lady of The Lake', but found that the prose translation, while it does have an archaic ring to it, is still easily accessible to the modern reader - and also an absorbing, sometimes graphic narrative.Since I don't read Latin, I'm at the mercy of Frank Justus Miller, but, for authenticity, the original Latin poem is printed on the left, facing the translation - not necessary for me, but an excellent resource for students.

Those considering 'The Metamorphoses' may be scared off by the idea that it's too difficult or too esoteric - which is what I believed before reading.I will say that readers who have little or no background in Greek and Roman myths may want to start with a modern retelling first, such as Edith Hamilton's 'Mythology', to familiarize themselves with some of the names and locations.(For young children, I'd suggest D'Aulaire's 'Book of Greek Myths' which I found absolutely spellbinding in grade school.)Ovid's style accepts axiomatically that his readers were intimately familiar with his subject.Even though I thought I was already well-grounded in mythology, I still found Ovid worthwhile - other authors, for reasons of taste or personal sensibilities, often omit the most sensational stories (Tereus of Thrace, for example).

The idea of assigning a star value to a work that has survived for two millennia is ridiculous, but I did enjoy it.I found Ovid's habit of connecting the cycle of myths together to be somewhat difficult to follow at times, and struggled with place names also, but overall I found this to be an engaging work in an attractive format, and I look forward to the second volume.

Excellent if occasionally archaic parallel translation
The left page has the original in Latin and the right has an English translation. The set up of the text and plenty of line numbering allows you to easily track the corresponding phrases. There are occasionally some English words or phrases that sound old fashioned which is hardly a surprise since this is a translation almost a hundred years old. The original 1915 translation was corrected for errors in 1921 and the type reset in 1960. The book is a hard cover with good quality opaque paper that will accept pencil notations and erasures without substantial damage. The typeface is clear, well spaced and of adequate size. The six volumes of Ovid's works in this series include two covering the Metamorphoses. I found these to be particularly useful in following what liberties had been taken in other translations of this work.

Ovid is the Master
I wrote a thesis on Ovid in college, so I'm a little biased, but this is one great translation.I love the Loeb series in general, and haven't seen a single edition that hasn't been well translated and edited.If you're reading a classic, read a Loeb.

Finest Book by Rome's Greatest Author
Ovid is by far the greatest Roman poet. Certainly, Vergil's work must not be overlooked, with his excellent style and powerful emotion (a favorite scene of mine is the death of Laocoon); however, Ovid surpasses Rome's poetlaureate by leaps and bounds: Ovid's dactylic hexameter is ornate andprecise, and his poetry contains a daring irreverence that outragedAugustus. Few authors have surpassed the power of Ovid's pen, and his_Metamorphoses_ is his best work.

Although I am not entirely impressedwith pedestrian prose translations of poetry, the Lobe edition'sside-by-side translation provides the reader an adequate aid to begin tograsp the poet's beauty.

(If one desires to read Ovid's _Metamorphoses_in English, I highly recommend Rolfe Humprhies's excellent translation.)

A Must for anyone interested in Latin!
The Metamorphoses, of course, is one of, if not the, classical world'sgreatest mythological treatises.The Loeb edition's convenient format oforiginal Latin text opposite a clear, concise English translation isinvaluable for anyone who has ever been interested in Latin, and awonderful study guide for the Latin scholar. Highly recommended. ... Read more

Product Description
A workbook of exercises to accompany "Latin via Ovid." ... Read more

Customer Reviews (5)

Latin via Ovid Translations
This might be of some use to people studying Latin using the Latin via Ovid textbook!

[...]

PREVIEW:
Chapter One - Geographical Map

Here is a geographical map. The map is small, but the lands are large. The map is good. Europe and Africa and Asia are continents. The lands are beautiful in Europe, in Africa, in Asia.
Look at the lands in Europe. Britain, Gaul, Germany, Spain, Italy, Greece are in Europe. Look at the islands: Sicily, Sardinia, Corsica, Crete, Cyprus. Where are the islands? They are in the Mediterranean sea. Are the islands large? Yes, the islands are large. The Peloponnesus is a peninsula. Spain, Greece, Italy are large peninsulas. Rome is in Italy.
Look at Africa. Look at the lands in Africa: Mauritius, Numidia, Libya, Ethiopia, Egypt. Carthage is in Africa. In Dido Africa, the Phoenician queen lived and ruled.
Look at Asia. Look at the lands in Asia. The lands in Asia are Asia Minor, Armenia, Mesopotamia, Arabia, Syria, Phoenicia. Look at the small island of Phoenicia. The island is small - Tyrus. Europa, the girl in the first story, she lives in Phoenicia. Is the island large? The island is not large; it is small.

VISIT OUR WEBSITE FOR COMPLETE TRANSLATIONS OF THE LATIN VIA OVID BOOK!

[...]

Bo, bis, bit, bimus, bitus, bunt, baby
Mr. Rossi was one of the best teachers I ever had.Buy the Maestro's book!!

Practice workbook is a success!
I used this workbook in conjunction to the Latin Via Ovid textbook and found both to be a successful combination. The workbook reinforces the lessons in the textbook and makes it so that a student can practice and apply what he or she has learned. I would recommend this product to anyone and found it VERY useful for my own needs.

Practice Practice makes perfect
It is a great compliment to the learning of latin with the text book Latin Via Ovid. Answers are provided in back to check work, and correct to further the learning of latin

My teacher wrote this book!
My Latin teacher wrote this book (Michael C. Rossi)!It's a good supplement to the Latin Via Ovid textbook.It also stands good by itself.Buy this book if you want more practice with Latin grammar or your Latinneeds brushing up. ... Read more

Product Description

Ovid (Publius Ovidius Naso, 43 BCE–17 CE), born at Sulmo, studied rhetoric and law at Rome. Later he did considerable public service there, and otherwise devoted himself to poetry and to society. Famous at first, he offended the emperor Augustus by his Ars Amatoria, and was banished because of this work and some other reason unknown to us, and dwelt in the cold and primitive town of Tomis on the Black Sea. He continued writing poetry, a kindly man, leading a temperate life. He died in exile.

Ovid's main surviving works are the Metamorphoses, a source of inspiration to artists and poets including Chaucer and Shakespeare; the Fasti, a poetic treatment of the Roman year of which Ovid finished only half; the Amores, love poems; the Ars Amatoria, not moral but clever and in parts beautiful; Heroides, fictitious love letters by legendary women to absent husbands; and the dismal works written in exile: the Tristia, appeals to persons including his wife and also the emperor; and similar Epistulae ex Ponto. Poetry came naturally to Ovid, who at his best is lively, graphic and lucid.

The Loeb Classical Library edition of Ovid is in six volumes.

Customer Reviews (2)

Solid edition, with Latin facing page.
If you want to see the Latin of the original poetry, this is the edition for you.The English is smoothly translated, and having the Latin is important to me. Make sure you get both of the two volumes so that you have all of the work.

Glad to have this in my collection.
It's a hardcover book I purchased for the Orpheus and Eurydice myth (for research.) It includes the entire story with information I had not seen in other versions of Ovid. It has the Latin across the page from the English.

The Pygmalian story and others in this volume will also be useful for future lectures.

My only quibble: the print is so small.

Kathleen Burt ... Read more

Product Description
Composed in Latin in the early years of the first century by the Roman poet Ovid, the "Metamorphoses" presents a collection of amazing tales of transformation based on Greek mythology and legend. Michael Simpson's prose translation of Ovid's masterpiece in the rapid and direct American idiom catches the swiftness and clarity of the Latin original. His introduction sketches the poet's life, describes his extant works, discusses his unusual exile to the west coast of the Black Sea (where he died), and provides a useful context for reading the "Metamorphoses."

Simpson has also prepared extensive endnotes that serve as mini-essays, illuminating the manifold aspects of the poem and offering commentary and interpretation that enable readers to enter Ovid's magical world and enjoy its richness. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (3)

Ian Myles Slater on: Simpson Transforms the Metamorphoses
This handsomely-produced volume is actually a double value -- two books in one. The first part is a prose translation of Ovid's fifteen-book, 12,000-line Latin poem on transformations effected by the Roman versions of the Greek gods, with footnotes indicating when, how and why Simpson is departing from a commonly used text (the Loeb Classical Library edition). This is very clear and readable, but there are several other translations available (including a very recent -- November 2003-- verse translation by Charles Martin, from W.W. Norton). I have seen most of them, and read several with care, and I like Simpson's version a lot. Despite being a good reflection of Ovid's intensely sophisticated style, it is as clear as the Mary M. Innes prose translation of 1955, which was reprinted for decades in the Penguin Classics series (although at the moment it seems to have been displaced by a Penguin edition of Arthur Golding's Elizabethan verse translation, at least in the Penguin catalogue, if not on store shelves). [A verse translation by David Raeburn was released as a Penguin Classic in Auust 2004, and may -- or may not -- be its permanent replacement.]

The second part -- about half the volume by number of pages, probably much more in terms of wordage, given the slightly smaller typeface used -- is a running commentary on the poem, generally closely integrated with Simpson's rendering. This is in itself a departure from recent practice. There are a number of excellent stand-alone studies of the "Metamorphoses," to which Simpson frequently refers the reader. There are commentaries of various ages on the Latin text (notably the recent volumes by William Anderson). Translations however, have generally contained much less comprehensive notes, and those with brief commentaries have tended to be "aides to the reader," supplying the myth-deprived modern with essential information on the ancient gods (e.g., that Jove is another name for Jupiter, and Phoebus is the same person as Apollo). Simpson's commentary far exceeds in scope and ambition, as well as size, the otherwise impressive set of notes by E.J. Kenney to A.D. Melville's verse translation (1986; Oxford World's Classics), to take one example.

In fact, the only comparable joining of a "modern" English translation and extended commentary with which I am familiar is the combination of Brookes More's verse translation with surveys of Ovid's sources and his influence on later art and literature by Wilmon Brewer (1895-1998), which was also published separately as "Ovid's Metamorphoses in European Culture." That translation-and-commentary appeared in five-book sections in 1933, 1941, and 1948, and the whole work was reprinted (somewhat "revised") as recently as 1978. Brewer's commentary remains interesting, but for understanding the poem it relies heavily on formerly current views about Ovid's supposed Hellenistic sources. By and large it amounts to a series of essays on the stories, rather than a close analysis of what Ovid does with them, and how he does it. (And, as it can be published separately, it is really another book about the poem, rather than a close commentary.)

Simpson is an authority on extant sources of Greek myths, and their subsequent literary developments -- see the commentary included in his translation of "The Library" of Apollodorus, published as "Gods and Heroes of the Greeks". In treating Ovid, however, Simpson usually notes only the most prominent of Ovid's literary predecessors, notably Homer, Hesiod, and Virgil, with whose versions of some of the stories Ovid's original audience would certainly have been familiar. Instead, he deals with Ovid's literary creation. Points of poetic style, and the moral and political implications of passages are covered. So are complex problems of the structure of the whole poem, and its parts, such as the tangle of cross-reference, tales told by characters in stories told by characters in Ovid's narrative. The result is an intriguing view of Ovid, not as a clever poet and skilled anthologist, but as a master of the narrative art.

The volume concludes with an exceptionally detailed index, which also serves as a concise glossary.

[Note: A very favorable review of this translation by Sara Mack, just now (September 30, 2004) available in the online "Bryn Mawr Classical Review," reports that a revised edition of Simpson's "Metamorphoses" is forthcoming, sometime during the current (2004-2005?) academic year. This will apparently will include some substantive revisions, as well as correction of numerous typographical errors (many of which I seem to have read past without noticing). I would urge the curious to consult Mack's review for a professional Latinist's perspective on the problem of translating Ovid, as well as a far more authoritative evaluation of Simpson's work than I can provide.]

First rate translation
Okay, so you're looking for a copy of the Metamorphoses in English, and are bewildered by the variety of translations which are widely available today -- Slavitt, Melville, Mandelbaum, Gregory, Humphries, and now Simpson.Translations are a tricky thing, especially translations of ancient authors, whose unique styles and literary conventions are next to impossible to convey in another language.Any translator of Ovid can only rarely hope to convey the most distinctive qualities of his verse -- the rapid hexameters, colorful diction, word play, shifting narrative tone, and cleverly rhetorical phrasing.In Latin, the Metamorphoses is a vivid and swiftly-paced poem, a richly-textured mix of stories that are amusing, witty, and always entertaining.Getting some of this -- indeed, any of this -- into English is a tall order.

The best translation is one that is highly readable and yet accurate, a faithful rendering of the most distinctive qualities of the original and not an exercise in the free invention of ideas and expressions that are nowhere to be found in the Latin.Verse translations frequently capture, at least somewhat, the feel and flow of classical poetry, and I confess that I am partial to them.On the other hand, prose translations of geat poetic works -- I am thinking especially of Vergil's Aeneid -- often fail utterly to convey the spirit of the original.However, upon reading this translation of the Metamorphoses I am beginning to reconsider this view.

Simpson's Metamorphoses is a triumph of the translator's art.In language that is clear, direct, and highly faithful to the diction and syntax of the original Latin, he has turned Ovidian verse into highly readable English prose. I am quite familiar with the Metamorphoses in Latin, and read it comfortably in the original.However, I often have a need to read the poem in English and am familiar with a wide variety of translations.Each has its own shortcomings, and some are frankly annoying to read at all.Simpson has managed to steer clear of the pitfalls waiting to trap those who seek to render Ovid into English, offering a version that should satisfy the needs of many different readers.

The value of this edition is greatly enhanced by over 200 pages of in-depth notes, a full bibliography of major scholarship on the poem, and a highly useful index.

I strongly recommend this version of the Metamorphoses, which will likely be the only one that I turn to for the indefinite future.

First rate translation
Okay, so you're looking for a copy of the Metamorphoses in English, and are bewildered by the variety of translations which are widely available today -- Slavitt, Melville, Mandelbaum, Gregory, Humphries, and now Simpson.Translations are a tricky thing, especially translations of ancient authors, whose unique styles and literary conventions are next to impossible to convey in another language.Any translator of Ovid can only rarely hope to convey the most distinctive qualities of his verse -- the rapid hexameters, colorful diction, word play, shifting narrative tone, and cleverly rhetorical phrasing.In Latin, the Metamorphoses is a vivid and swiftly-paced poem, a richly-textured mix of stories that are amusing, witty, and always entertaining.Getting some of this -- indeed, any of this -- into English is a tall order.

The best translation is one that is highly readable and yet accurate, a faithful rendering of the most distinctive qualities of the original and not an exercise in the free invention of ideas and expressions that are nowhere to be found in the Latin.Verse translations frequently capture, at least somewhat, the feel and flow of classical poetry, and I confess that I am partial to them.On the other hand, prose translations of geat poetic works -- I am thinking especially of Vergil's Aeneid -- often fail utterly to convey the spirit of the original.However, upon reading this translation of the Metamorphoses I am beginning to reconsider this view.

Simpson's Metamorphoses is a triumph of the translator's art.In language that is clear, direct, and highly faithful to the diction and syntax of the original Latin, he has turned Ovidian verse into highly readable English prose. I am quite familiar with the Metamorphoses in Latin, and read it comfortably in the original.However, I often have a need to read the poem in English and am familiar with a wide variety of translations.Each has its own shortcomings, and some are frankly annoying to read at all.Simpson has managed to steer clear of the pitfalls waiting to trap those who seek to render Ovid into English, offering a version that should satisfy the needs of many different readers.

The value of this edition is greatly enhanced by over 200 pages of in-depth notes, a full bibliography of major scholarship on the poem, and a highly useful index.

I strongly recommend this version of the Metamorphoses, which will likely be the only one that I turn to for the indefinite future. ... Read more

Product Description
"The Art of Love" is a vivaciously witty poem on the art of seduction, with illustrative stories interwoven. Ovid tells men how to find a suitable mistress, how to win her and retain her affections; he goes on to instruct women on the art of captivating and retaining a lover. These lessons are cleverly reversed in "Remedies for Love," in which the poet gives directions for falling out of love. This volume also contains "Cosmetics," "Ibis," and three poems now judged not to be by Ovid. Mozley's edition has been revised and updated by G. P. Goold. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

Fascinating Insights
I read this book as a part of a review of Roman Literature.I have to say, of almost all I have, Ovid's "The Art Of Love" gives the most insight into life in ancient Rome.It is also extremely funny, with jokes that still make you laugh after all these years. Of course the advice given is hardly usable today, but it is so well written, it deserves to be read by anyone interested in the art of love. ... Read more