The Erotic Poems (Classics) by Ovid

Author:Ovid
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Publisher: Penguin Books Ltd
Published: 2004-04-28T16:00:00+00:00

What he describes here–camouflaging his personal feelings, as so often, behind a smokescreen of mythic witticisms–is the psychological impact of falling in love with an actual person. The symptoms are well described in the following poem (Am. 1.2.1–10), and again masked by an elaborate quasi-mythical conceit, this time with political undertones. The girl is not identified yet: indeed, we do not learn her name till 1.5, by which time she has more than made her presence felt–always assuming that the same person is referred to throughout the earlier poems. Ovid is an expert at delayed-action effects: not for him the urgency of Propertius. I suspect that Ovid found his friend’s heart-on-the-sleeve approach a trifle vulgar, and more than a trifle ridiculous. It should not be deduced from this, however, that he despised Propertius’ poetry (no one could devote so much space to parodying what he did not at heart admire), or that he lacked passionate feelings himself. We shall have ample evidence on both points throughout the Amores.

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