Metamorphoses

The New, Annotated Edition

Ovid, Rolfe Humphries

• Publisher: Indiana University Press
• Year: 2018
• ISBN:
  9780253033703
• Topic: Littérature
• Subtopic: Poésie antique

Ovid's Metamorphoses is one of the most influential works of Western literature, inspiring artists and writers from Titian to Shakespeare to Salman Rushdie. These are some of the most famous Roman myths as you've never read them before—sensuous, dangerously witty, audacious—from the fall of Troy to birth of the minotaur, and many others that only appear in the Metamorphoses. Connected together by the immutable laws of change and metamorphosis, the myths tell the story of the world from its creation up to the transformation of Julius Caesar from man into god.

In the ten-beat, unrhymed lines of this now-legendary and widely praised translation, Rolfe Humphries captures the spirit of Ovid's swift and conversational language, bringing the wit and sophistication of the Roman poet to modern readers.

This special annotated edition includes new, comprehensive commentary and notes by Joseph D. Reed, Professor of Classics and Comparative Literature at Brown University.

BOOK TWELVE

The Invasion of Troy*

But Priam mourned for Aesacus, not knowing

He lived, a wingèd creature. To the tomb

That bore his name Hector brought sacrifice,

So did the other brothers, all but Paris,

Who, not long after, brought upon his country

Long warfare over the woman he had stolen.

A thousand ships were launched, and all the Greeks,

Banded together, followed, and they would have

Taken their vengeance sooner, but the storms

Made the sea pathless, and Boeotia held them,

Impatient, at the little port of Aulis.

When here,* as always, they had gotten ready

Their sacrifice for Jove, just as the altar

Glowed with the lighted fires, they saw a serpent,

Blue-green in color, creeping up a plane-tree

Above them, toward a nest, high up, which held

Eight fledglings. These, together with the mother,

Flying too close to her doomed brood, the serpent

Seized and devoured. Amazement seized the people,

But the augur Calchas saw the meaning clearly:

“Rejoice, O Greeks: we shall win the war, and Troy

Go down before us, but our task will be

Of long duration: the nine birds mean nine years.”

Meanwhile the serpent, coiled around the branches,

Was changed to stone, and the stone kept the form

Of the twining serpent.

Nereus continued

Boisterous over the waves;* he would not carry

The war across the sea, and there were people

Who thought that Neptune, who had built the walls

Of Troy, was therefore bound to spare the city.

Calchas knew better, and said so: virgin blood

Must satisfy the virgin goddess’ anger.

The common cause was stronger than affection,

The king subdued the father; Agamemnon

Led Iphigenia to the solemn altar,

And while she stood there, ready for the offering

Of her chaste blood, and even the priests were weeping,

Diana yielded, veiled their eyes with cloud,

And even while the rites went on, confused

With darkness and the cries of people praying,

Iphigenia was taken, and a deer

Left in her place as victim,* so the goddess

Was satisfied; her anger and the ocean’s

Subsided, and the thousand ships responded

To the fresh winds astern and, with much trouble,

Came to the Phrygian shores.

There is a place*

At the world’s center, triple boundary

Of land and sky and sea. From here all things,

No matter what, are visible; every word

Comes to these hollow ears. Here Rumor dwells,

Her palace high upon the mountain-summit,

With countless entrances, thousands on thousands,

And never a door to close them. Day and night

The halls stand open, and the bronze re-echoes,

Repeats all words, redoubles every murmur.

There is no quiet, no silence anywhere,

No uproar either, only the subdued

Murmur of little voices, like the murmur

Of sea-waves heard far-off, or the last rumble

Of thunder dying in the cloud. The halls

Are filled with presences that shift and wander,

Rumors in thousands, lies and truth together,

Confused, confusing. Some fill idle ears

With stories, others go far-off to tell

What they have heard, and every story grows,

And each new teller adds to what he hears.

Here is Credulity, and reckless Error,

Vain Joy, and panic Fear, sudden Sedition,

Whispers that none can trace, and she, their goddess,

Sees all that happens in heaven, on land, on ocean,

Searching the world for news.

She spread the tidings

That the Greek fleet was coming, and brave armies,

And so the Trojans, dressed in readiness,

Received them at their shores. Protesilaus*

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