Metamorphoses
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{{otheruses1|the poem}}
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[[Image:Ovidius Metamorphosis - George Sandy's 1632 edition.jpg|thumb|right|Cover of [[George Sandys]]'s 1632 edition of ''Ovid's Metamorphosis Englished'']]
The '''''Metamorphoses''''' by the [[Ancient Rome|Roman]] poet [[Ovid]] is a [[Narrative poetry|narrative poem]] in fifteen books that describes the [[Creation (theology)|creation]] and [[history]] of the world. Completed in 8 AD, it has remained one of the most popular works of [[mythology]], being the Classical work best known to medieval writers and thus having a great deal of influence on medieval poetry.
==Content==
Ovid works his way through his subject matter, often in an apparently arbitrary fashion, by jumping from one transformation tale to another, sometimes retelling what had come to be seen as central events in the world of Greek myth and sometimes straying in odd directions. The poem is often called a mock-epic. It is written in [[dactylic hexameter]], the form of the great heroic and nationalistic [[epic poem]]s; both those of the ancient tradition (the [[Iliad]] and [[Odyssey]]) and of Ovid's own day (the [[Aeneid]]). It begins with the ritual "invocation of the [[muse]]", and makes use of traditional [[epithet]]s and circumlocutions. But instead of following and extolling the deeds of a human [[hero]], it leaps from story to story with little connection.
[[Image:Tizian 012.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Titian]]'s ''Danaë'', one of innumerable paintings inspired by the ''Metamorphoses''.]]
[[Image:Apollo&daphne.jpg|thumb|right|220px|[[Bernini]]'s ''Apollo and Daphne'', an iconic sculpture based on Ovid's ''Metamorphoses''. Daphne (I.452-567) is a dryad who is transformed into a laurel tree to protect her from rape by Apollo. ]]
The recurring theme, as with nearly all of Ovid's work, is that of love — be that personal love or love personified in the figure of ''Amor'' ([[Cupid]]). Indeed, the other [[Roman mythology|Roman gods]] are repeatedly perplexed, humiliated, and made ridiculous by Amor, an otherwise relatively minor god of the [[Pantheon (gods)|pantheon]] who is the closest thing this mock-epic has to a hero. [[Apollo]] comes in for particular ridicule as Ovid shows how irrational love can confound the god of pure [[reason]]. While few individual stories are outright [[sacrilegious]]{{who}}, the work as a whole inverts the accepted order, elevating humans and human passions while making the gods and their desires and conquests objects of low humor.
[[Image:Apollo and Daphne.jpg|thumb|220px|right|''[[Apollo and Daphne]]'' by [[Antonio Pollaiuolo]], one tale of transformation in the ''Metamorphoses''—he lusts after her and she escapes him by turning into a [[bay laurel]].]]
==Main episodes==
* Book I: [[Greek_mythology#Cosmogony_and_cosmology|Cosmogony]], [[Ages of Man]], [[Gigantes]], [[Daphne]], [[Io (mythology)|Io]];
* Book II: [[Phaëton]], [[Callisto (mythology)|Callisto]], [[Jupiter (mythology)|Jupiter]] and [[Europa (mythology)|Europa]];
* Book III: [[Cadmus]], [[Actaeon]], [[Echo (mythology)|Echo]] et [[Pentheus]];
* Book IV: [[Pyramus and Thisbe]], [[Perseus]] and [[Andromeda (mythology)|Andromeda]].
* Book V: [[Phineas]], the [[Proserpina|Rape of Proserpina]];
* Book VI: [[Arachne]], [[Niobe]], [[Philomela (princess of Athens)|Philomela]] and [[Procne]];
* Book VII: [[Medea]], [[Cephalus]] and [[Procris]];
* Book VIII: [[Nisos]] and [[Scylla (princess)|Scylla]], [[Daedalus]] and [[Icarus]], [[Baucis and Philemon]];
* Book IX: [[Heracles]], [[Byblis]];
* Book X: [[Eurydice]], [[Hyacinth (mythology)|Hyacinth]], [[Pygmalion (mythology)|Pygmalion]], [[Adonis]], [[Atalanta]], [[Cyparissus]];
* Book XI: [[Orpheus]], [[Midas]], [[Alcyone]] and [[Ceyx]];
* Book XII: [[Iphigeneia]], [[Centaur]]s, [[Achilles]];
* Book XIII: the [[Trojan_War#The_sack_of_Troy|Sack of Troy]], [[Aeneas]];
* Book XIV: [[Scylla]], Aeneas, [[Romulus]];
* Book XV: [[Pythagoras]], [[Hippolytus (mythology)|Hippolytus]], [[Aesculapius]], [[Julius Caesar|Caesar]].
==Inspirations and adaptations==
The story of Coronis and Phoebus Apollo was adapted by [[Geoffrey Chaucer]] in the [[Canterbury Tales]], where it forms the basis for the Manciple's tale.
The Metamorphoses was a considerable influence on English playwright [[William Shakespeare]]; however, claims that the 1567 [[Arthur Golding]] translation of the Metamorphoses greatly influenced Shakespeare are flimsily evidenced. Shakespeare incorporates several details from the Metamorphoses into his work that weren't in Golding's translation, so it can be safely assumed that Shakespeare did read the Latin Metamorphoses himself, as opposed to completely relying on Golding's translation {{Fact|date=October 2007}}. Shakespeare's ''[[Romeo and Juliet]]'' is a clear adaptation of the story of [[Pyramus and Thisbe]] (Metamorphoses Book 4), and, in ''[[A Midsummer Night's Dream]]'', a band of amateur actors performs a play about Pyramus and Thisbe. In [[Titus Andronicus]] the story of Lavinia's rape is drawn from [[Tereus]]' rape of [[Philomela]], and the text of Metamorphoses is used within the play to enable Titus to interpret his daughter's story.
*In 1613, Spanish poet [[Luis de Góngora]] wrote an illustrious poem titled [[La Fábula de Polifemo y Galatea]] that retells the story of Polyphemus, Galatea and Acis found in Book XIII of the Metamorphoses.
*In 1625, sculptor [[Gian Lorenzo Bernini]] finished his piece entitled [[Apollo and Daphne (Bernini)|Apollo and Daphne]], taken from the episode in Book 1 in which [[Apollo]], pierced by a love-inducing arrow from [[Cupid]], pursues the fleeing nymph [[Daphne]]. This episode furthermore has been treated repeatedly in opera, notably by [[Jacopo Peri]] (''[[Dafne]]'') in 1597 and [[Richard Strauss]] (''[[Daphne (opera)|Daphne]]'', with a libretto that deviates significantly from Ovid's account) in 1938.
*In 1783, Austrian composer [[Karl Ditters von Dittersdorf]] wrote twelve symphonies on selected stories of the Metamorphoses; only six survive, corresponding to stories from the first six books.<ref>[http://www.naxos.com/catalogue/item.asp?item_code=8.553368# under "About this Recording" at bottom left. Keith Anderson, liner notes for ''The 18th Century Symphony: Dittersdorf: Sinfonias on Ovid's Metamorphoses Nos. 1 - 3'', 1995]</ref>
*In 1951, British composer [[Benjamin Britten]] wrote a [[Six Metamorphoses after Ovid|piece]] for solo [[Oboe]] incorporating six of Ovid's mythical characters.
*In 2002, Author [[Mary Zimmerman]] adapted some of Ovid's myths into a play by the same title, and the open-air-theatre group London Bubble also adapted it in 2006.
*[[Naomi Iizuka]]'s ''[[Polaroid Stories]]'' also bases its format on Metamorphoses, setting the classic play in a modern time with drug-addicted, teenage versions of many of the characters from the original play.
*[[Acis and Galatea]], a [[masque]] by [[Händel]], is based on the [[eponymous]] characters out of the Metamorphoses, as is [[Jean-Baptiste Lully|Lully]]'s opera [[Acis et Galatée]].
==Manuscript tradition==
Collaborative editorial effort has been investigating the various manuscripts of ''Metamorphoses'', some forty-five complete texts or substantial fragments,<ref>R. J. Tarrant, 2004. ''P. Ouidi Nasonis Metamorphoses.'' (Oxford Classical Texts_ Oxford: Clarendon Press: ''praefatio''.</ref> since the High Middle Ages; though early emendations made by readers based on comparisons of this popular text has resulted in contamination, so that there are no isolated manuscript traditions, the result of several centuries of critical reading is that the poet's meaning is firmly established on the basis of the manuscript tradition or restored by conjecture where the tradition is deficient. The modern critical editions are two: W. S. Anderson's, first published in 1977 in the Teubner series, and R. J. Tarrant's, published in 2004 by the Oxford Clarendon Press.
==Notes==
{{reflist}}
==See also==
* [[List of characters in Metamorphoses]]
* [[Tales from Ovid]] - [[Ted Hughes]]' poetical work
==External links==
{{wikisourcepar|la:Metamorphoseon}}
{{Commonscat|Metamorphoses (Ovid)}}
* '''Latin text with English translation'''
** [http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/latin/ovid/ovidillust.html Ovid Illustrated: The Renaissance Reception of Ovid in Image and Text] (An elaborate environment allowing simultaneous access to Latin text, English translations, commentary from multiple sources along with wood cut illustrations by Virgil Solis.)
** [http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/cgi-bin/ptext?lookup=Ov.+Met.+1 ''Metamorphoses'' in Latin edition and English translations] (From [[Perseus Project|Perseus]] with hyperlinked commentary, mythological, and grammatical references)
* '''Latin text'''
** [http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/latin/ovid/index.html University of Virginia: Metamorphoses]
**[http://www.thelatinlibrary.com/ovid.html The Latin Library: P. OVIDI NASONIS OPERA]
* '''English translation'''
** By A. S. Kline, 2000
*** [http://www.tkline.freeserve.co.uk/Ovhome.htm Poetry in Translation: Ovid: Metamorphoses]. (Enhanced viewer with links and notes. Can be downloaded in different formats.)
*** [http://www.mythology.us Mythology: Metamorphoses]
** By Sir Samuel Garth, John Dryden et al., 1717
*** [http://classics.mit.edu/Ovid/metam.html Internet Classics Archive: Ovid's ''Metamorphoses'']
*** [http://www.globusz.com/ebooks/Ovid/00000010.htm Ovid's ''Metamorphoses'']
** By Others:
*** [http://www.elizabethanauthors.com/ovid00.htm Elizabethan Authors: Ovid's ''Metamorphoses''], trans. by Arthur Golding, 1567.
*** [http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/latin/ovid/sandys/contents.htm Ovid's ''Metamorphoses''] trans. by George Sandys, 1632.
*** [http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/cgi-bin/ptext?lookup=Ov.+Met.+1.1 Ovid's ''Metamorphoses''] trans. by Brooke Moore, 1922.
*** [http://www.textkit.com/learn/ID/154/author_id/71/ TextKit: Ovid's ''Metamorphoses'', Books I–IV], trans. Rev. Dr. Giles, a learning translation/crib in PDF graphic format.
* '''Insight and commentary'''
** [http://www.uvm.edu/~hag/ovid The Ovid Project: Metamorphising the Metamorphoses] (Illustrations by Johann Whilhelm Baur (1600–1640) and anonymous illustrations from George Sandys's edition of 1640.)
** [http://www.tonykline.co.uk/Browsepages/Latin/AHoneycombForAphrodite.htm ''A Honeycomb for Aphrodite'' by A. S. Kline]
** [http://larryavisbrown.homestead.com/files/xeno.ovid1.htm Ovid's ''Metamorphoses'', An introduction and commentary by Larry A. Brown].
** [http://www.kcl.ac.uk/humanities/cch/wlm/analyticalonomasticon/index.htm ''An Analytical Onomasticon'' to the ''Metamorphoses'' of Ovid] (Concordance and narrative index.)
[[Category:1st century BC works]]
[[Category:Greek mythology]]
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[[Category:Narrative poems]]
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