Latin Reading Group: Ovid’s Metamorphoses
“Of shapes transformed into new bodies, my mind compels me to speak.” In the first line of the Metamorphoses, Ovid announces his grand theme of transformation: of the elements and of the natural world itself, of cities and empires, of bodies, minds, and souls. Ovid’s vision of universal flux—articulated in a poem that itself defies genre—has captivated readers, and especially poets, from antiquity to the present. Composed in dactylic hexameter, the meter of epic poetry since Homer, the Metamorphoses incorporates, satirizes, and transforms the narratives of Greek and Roman mythology, grappling with a seeming cacophony of themes: immortals versus mortals, hubris, love, betrayal, death, and the impermanence of body and soul. How might we locate Ovid’s intense concern with the vulnerability and transformation of the body within its contemporary political world, one in which senatorial rule is becoming the rule of the Emperor and in which the Emperor is becoming a god?
In this course, we will read in the original Latin the proem of Book 1, which recounts the chaotic origins of the world; the story of Procne and Philomela in Book 6; and, time permitting, the Pythagorean accounts of vegetarianism and metempsychosis (the transmigration of souls) in Book 15. As we go, we will probe a minor but salient theme embedded in the Metamorphoses: silence as a rhetorical and philosophical tool. What indeed does Ovid mean when he begins the Metamorphoses by saying that his mind induces him (fert) to speak of transformations? How does the story of Philomela and her ability to communicate non-verbally fit into ancient accounts of communicative silence? Can we identify any vestiges of this in Ovid’s portrayal of the teachings of Pythagoras, whose followers in antiquity were known to train in silence? As we work through a close reading of Ovid’s Latin, we will discuss how, in this foundational work, he appropriated and transformed both Greek and Roman traditions of silence.
Course Schedule
Wednesday, 6:30-8:30pm ETFebruary 04 — March 11, 2026
6 weeks
$335.00
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