Excellent poetry and mythology - Rated 
Roman poet Ovid was born in central Italy in 43BC. In AD 8 he was exiled to the Black Sea by Emperor Augustus for reasons that have never been made clear. He died around Ad 17/18, never having returned to Rome despite constant petitioning.
Metamorphoses is his epic poem on change. It covers many metamorphoses, mostly humans being turned into animals, plants, birds etc by the gods. The most unlucky name seemed to be Cycnus as you are likely to be turned into a swan at some point! It shows how it never pays to scorn the gods as you will get turned into a spider, horse, stag to be hunted by your own hounds, raven etc... The other key transforming factor was grief. People weeping were liable to turn into birds or plants/trees mostly and Hecuba even turned into a dog.
Lots of famous tales and people were included in this poem. Everyone from Icarus to Theseus, the Minatour, Narcissus and Echo, Arachne, Hercules and Aeneas. The tales ranged from very gory to very irreverent via erotic, Ovid had a very interesting sense of humour which came across in most of his tales (this possibly caused the trouble with Augustus). His treatment of the gods is interesting, he focuses on their human aspects of pride, revenge and their tendency to be quick to anger. Yes the poem is very long, but I really enjoyed it and would recommend it. It was interesting as well to read something from a roman perspective after trying out some of the greek classics.
An Amazing feat of Storytelling-Ovid, Metamorphoses - Rated 
This translation offers a concise and very useful set of explanatory notes and a glossary. Ovid's work is divided into legendary stories of the ancient world, each leading on from the other to give an epic poem of gods, monsters, heroes and cities. Ovid's poetic tone is engaging and its not hard to see why his work has captured the imaginations of so many great artists and writers. Some of the legends included are The Creation, Phaethon, Europa, Narcissus and Echo, Bacchus (and the cult of Dionysus), Pyramus and Thisbe, Perseus (and the Gorgon), the Rape of Proserpina, Medea and Jason, Orpheus, and so on. Each of the tales focus on the theme of transformation as indicated in the title-whether it be the gorgon's head turning its foes into marble or Daphne changing into a laurel tree.
Gods and monsters! - Rated
For me this verse translation has become a delightful source of reference for Greek and Roman mythology, European literature, art, and opera. And, most importantly, the stories are a lot of fun and entertainment. I have continued to enjoy this book, using the excellent Contents and Glossary to look up my favourite tales and to refresh my memory on the numerous Gods, demi-Gods, kings, maidens, nymphs that populate the pages. First time round I read the poem from start to finish and soon realised it was going to be impossible for me to recall all the multiple plot progressions, people and places, family trees, the multifarious metamorphosing. So I keep coming back when I, for instance, want to remember the myth associated with a Bernini sculpture or reread the almost comic strip violence of the battle of the Lapiths and Centaurs. This edition has a useful introduction, which helped me understand the historical context and themes of Ovid's vivid descriptions of heroes, death, incest, rape, sensuality, love, obsession, beauty and the ever-present metamorphoses. I found the translation very accessible and benefits from a vocal reading.
A brilliant translation of a sophisticated and seminal poem - Rated
Ovid was ignored by classical scholars for a long time as being frivolous and just not serious enough. He has now been rehabilitated and Metamorphoses is recognised as being one of the most complex, sophisticated and problematic poems of the age of Augustus.
It's also one of the wittiest and most accessible, and this translation deserves prizes for being both faithful to the original Latin and yet reading as if it were written yesterday in modern english blank verse.
Too often regarded as a compendium of Greek and Roman myths, Metamorphoses should be read as a continuous poem telling the story of the world from the creation to the apotheosis of Julius Caesar - but in Ovid's own inimitable and often funny and scurrilous fashion. Along the way, he takes in almost every story ever told in the ancient world: Narcissus and Echo, Orpheus and Eurydice, Pygmalion, Medea, Venus and Adonis, the Trojan war, the foundation of Rome, Romulus and Remus.
His style is witty, urbane and sophisticated, and he plays games with every genre of literature: love poetry, epic, philosophy, Greek science.
The ostensible theme of the poem that unifies the 12 books is change, but modern scholars recognise that this too is part of the game Ovid is playing with his readers, and the debate continues over what Ovid is 'about'.
More interesting, perhaps, is the way in which he plays with our preconceptions of gender, power, status and authority - but all with the lightest of touches that never reduce the brilliant story-telling to mere polemic.
Writing after Vergil, on one level Metamorphoses is a response to and a dialogue with the Aeneid, and has sometime been read as an antidote to the supposedly pro-Augustan sympathies of Vergil. Certainly Ovid was banished from Rome by the Emperor Augustus just after the poem was published though the reason cannot be known due to the loss of all sources relating to the the incident. However, many scholars now recognise the other subversive voices within the Aeneid itself, questioning the imperial mission of Rome and Augustus, so maybe Ovid and Vergil are not so far apart at all...
In any case, the Metamorphoses remains one of the most brilliant examples of the pure power of superb story-telling, and has inspired artists from Shakespeare to Bernini to Ted Hughes. Read it.
( Un ) pleasant surprises and no happy endings. - Rated
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.
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