What is this?
This is a newsletter dedicated to delivering the works of Augustan Latin poet P. Ovidius Naso via email.
The newsletter we are currently running is “Evenings with Ovid,” an 11-part podcast spanning the first book of Ovid's Tristia, released every Friday at 12 PM EST from September 2, 2022 to November 11, 2022.
Ovid’s Fastorum Libri Sex (Six Books of the Calendar) will begin on January 1, 2023.
If you’re interested in our previous offerings, the entirety of Ovid’s Metamorphoses is available in our Archive.
Why Should I Read This?
Ovid is one of the great Golden Age Latin poets, making his Latin reasonably accessible to anyone who has had about 3 years of high school level Latin or 2 years college level Latin. I have attempted to include resources that would be helpful for the readings.
“Evenings with Ovid” is read aloud in the original Latin, accompanied by A. L. Wheeler’s 1924 translation. The edition I am using for the Tristia is from the Loeb Classical Library (from this website of Loeb editions that are out of copyright). The English is fairly outdated, and I suspect purposefully archaic in parts, but none the less fun to listen to, and to read.
The English edition I am using (from the same website) for the Metamorphoses is F. J. Miller’s from 1921. The English is slightly outdated, but still very readable.
The English edition I am using (from the same website) for the Fasti is J. G. Frazer’s from 1931. The English is outdated, but can be quite poetic and is still immensely readable.
Who is P. Ovidius Naso?
Commonly known as “Ovid,” he was a prolific Augustan/Golden Age Latin poet, known for writing such works at the Fasti, the Metamorphoses, the Amores, the Heroides, and the Ars Amatoria, among several others. Ovid was born into a prominent Equestrian family (the “knightly” Roman class) in Sulmo, Italy on March 20, 40 BCE. He initially trained to be an orator (lawyer), and held several small public offices, but due to his passion for poetry, he resigned from public work. While his early work is lascivious and irreverent, his later corpus is more serious, including the poems serialized here. Ovid, for his work the Ars Amatoria, as well as an additional, unknown offense, was exiled from Rome in 8 CE, and died in Tomis, Scythia (on the Black Sea coast of modern Romania) in 17 or 18 CE.
What are the Tristia?
The Tristia are five books of epistolary elegiac couplets recounting Ovid’s exile, his tumultuous winter-time journey to Scythia, and his pleas to compatriots back in Rome, as well as to the less-than-friendly Emperor Augustus.
This first series of “Evenings with Ovid” will cover the first book of the Tristia, 11 poems covering the delivery of the Tristia to Rome, Ovid’s time on the harsh and unforgiving winter-time seas, his final hours in Rome with his beloved wife, and a variety of letters to cherished and reviled friends alike.
What are the Metamorphoses?
The Metamorphoses is Ovid’s magnum opus, completed and published prior to 8 AD. It covers a variety of topics, all pertaining to the central theme of “transformation,” though 15 books. Each book is one continuous poem, shifting from one topic to the next without breaking the narrative. The narrative unfolds in dactylic hexameter, beginning with the creation of the world and ending with the deification of Julius Caesar. The work in all covers almost 12,000 lines and over 250 myths.
What are the Fasti ?
The Fasti are six poems, about 800 lines each, dedicated to the first six Roman months (Ianuarius, Februarius, Martius, Aprilis, Maius, and Junius) and celebrating the festivals, holy days, and aetiologies celebrated within each month. They are particularly patriotic, singing the praises of the Imperial family and of the Roman Empire, and in some passages, certainly propagandistic. Ovid began writing the Fasti prior to 8 AD, and likely worked on it contemporaneously with his magnum opus the Metamorphoses, but the work was interrupted by his exile, truncating the poem from the planned 12 books to 6. He continued to edit the existing books of the Fasti while in exile, going as far as changing the dedicatee in book one from Augustus to Germanicus after the former’s death.
Who am I?
You can call me M! I have a BA in Classical Studies, and spend most of my free time reading Latin, particularly the elegists, but especially Ovid. If you are interested, you may follow this newsletter on tumblr @ovid-daily.
