Ovid's Metamorphoses
Published on 30. September 2005
Book
Paperback/Softback
180 pages
978-1-85754-776-4 (ISBN)
Description
Arthur Golding (1536-1606), translated the "Metamorphoses" of Ovid into vigorous, supple English 'fourteeners', beguiling readers with the pace and freshness of the ancient narrative. His was the translation that Shakespeare knew, and like the magical forest of "A Midsummer Night's Dream", Golding's stories unfold in a landscape at once homely and enchanted. Here Philemon and Baucis entertain two great gods to a meal of boiled bacon and radishes; Actaeon, out hunting with his hounds Greedigut, Patch, Beautie and Snatch, stumbles upon the goddess Diana; farm labourers flee in fear from the mob of bacchantes tearing Orpheus to pieces, scattering their 'mattocks, rakes and shovels'; and like the Brueghel painting, Icarus' doomed flight is witnessed by amazed 'shepeherdes leaning then / On sheepehookes and the ploughmen on the handles of their plough'. Golding captures Ovid's delight in the variety of the physical world; its strangeness, beauties and horrors, in human psychology and divine transformations. Peter Scupham provides an introduction to the text, a full bibliography and background notes on stories and characters.
More details
Language
English
Place of publication
Manchester
United Kingdom
Publishing group
Carcanet Press Ltd
Dimensions
Height: 216 mm
Width: 135 mm
ISBN-13
978-1-85754-776-4 (9781857547764)
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Schweitzer Classification
Persons
Arthur Golding was the younger son of a high ranking Puritan family. He counted the Earl of Oxford and Sir Philip Sydney among his patrons, as well as the Earl of Leicester, to whom he dedicated his Metamorphoses. Golding's prosperity did not last: in 1593 he was briefly imprisoned for debt. He died in 1606. Editor Peter Scupham was born in Liverpool in 1933 and studied at Emmanuel College, Cambridge. He founded The Mandeville Press with John Mole and he is a fellow of the Royal Society of Literature. He has ten previous collections of poetry published by Oxford University Press and Anvil. He now lives in Norfolk and runs a catalogue book business with Margaret Steward.
Content
Table of Contents Introduction Bibliography Ovid's Metamorphoses translated by Arthur Golding The Preface to the Reader Golding on Ovid's Purpose (lines 1-222) from Book I The Creation and the Four Ages of Man (lines 1-170) Apollo and Daphne (lines 545-700) from Book II Phaeton and Phoebus Apollo (lines 142-274) The Death of Phaeton (lines 333-458) from Book III Diana and Actaeon (lines 150-304) Echo and Narcissus (lines 431-644) from Book IV Pyramus and Thisbe (lines 67-201) Hermaphroditus and Salmacis (lines 346-481) from Book VI Tereus, Philomela and Procne (lines 540-855) from Book VII Jason, Medea, Aeson and Pelias (lines 1-452) The Plague at Aegina (lines 652-852) from Book VIII Daedalus and Icarus (lines 201-342) Philemon and Baucis (lines 795-909) from Book IX Byblis and Caunus (lines 541-786) from Book X Orpheus and Eurydice (lines 1-160) Pygmalion (lines 261-327) Myrrha and Cinyras (lines 328-595) Venus and Adonis, Hippomenes and Atalanta (lines 596-863) from Book XI The Death of Orpheus, King Midas (lines 1-216) Ceyx and Alcyone (lines 471-864) from Book XIII Acis, Galatea and Polyphemus (lines 885-1052) from Book XV Pythagoras: Vegetarianism and Transmigration (lines 66-291) Pythagoras: Metamorphosis in Nature and History (lines 375-532) Ovid's Farewell (lines 984-995) Notes on the Text Names and Places Glossary