Preview

Why Is Ovid Considered In Everyday Life

Good Essays
Open Document
Open Document
1022 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Why Is Ovid Considered In Everyday Life
Ovid or Publius Ovidius Naso was a Roman philosopher known for his work titled Metamorphoses. In this book, he created numerous amounts of poetry containing characters from different eras. Some of the characters used are either fictional, mythological, or real world figures. His poems give readers a series of emotions making them judge their lives. Ovid writes his poems with careful precision. He romanticizes his poems in the hopes of displaying a clear message to the reader. In this collection of poems, translated by Rolfe Humphries, readers can observe that Ovid is trying to teach lessons that should be considered in their everyday lives. In his poems, Ovid wants readers to understand what he thinks should be known to them. He does this by providing stories in the format of a poem with a moral that captures the reader's attention. An example of this is in The Story of Tereus, Procne, and Philomela, where the poet writes how the antagonist named Tereus …show more content…
As readers go through the mythical poem, they feel that Niobe is a victim of the wrath of the gods. This is exactly what Ovid intended as he explains how the Roman goddess Latona, mother of the god Apollo and the goddess Diana, called for the death of Niobe's fourteen children as retaliation for Niobe's pride against the gods (136). The scene when Apollo and Diana kill Niobe's children is quite fearful for readers, as they have no remorse in regards to the age of each offspring. Ovid utilizes this fear of the gods power to have readers understand that one should never believe that they are stronger and above the gods. He puts this belief, which he teaches to readers, into action as Niobe receives an additional punishment for her pride against the gods. This reprimand intensifies the lesson as Niobe's "vitals hardened to rock," and readers are meant to interpret that she is turned into a small stone on Mount Sipylus

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Good Essays

    “The Odyssey” , by Homer is an epic poem telling the journey of Odysseus on his way back home to Ithaca. Homer wrote the Odyssey to show how heroic Odysseus is and how he served as a model for all his people. His message to the people was that it takes more than just strength to be a hero. All heroes have different qualities that define them and Odysseus had the traits of a H…

    • 307 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    In some versions of their myth, Artemis was born first and helped her mother to deliver Apollo.Niobe, queen of Thebes, once boasted that she was better than Leto because she had many children while the goddess had but two. Artemis and Apollo avenged this insult to their mother by killing all or most of Niobe's children with their arrows. The weeping Niobe was transformed into stone, in which form she continued to weep.When Apollo noticed that Artemis was spending a great deal of time hunting with the giant Orion, he decided to put an end to the relationship. He challenged Artemis to prove her skill at archery by shooting at an object floating far out at sea. Her shot was perfect. The target turned out to be the head of Orion.Artemis is generally depicted as a young woman clad in buckskins, carrying a bow and a quiver of arrows. She is often accompanied by wild creatures such as a stag or she-bear.…

    • 465 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Jean’s work starts with an account of things that he did during the course of his life. He says that he is about to embark on a journey, and he chooses to confess all of the in the process. This shows that his work is a combination of his life experiences in this world and he later discusses very important matters that help the reader to know the importance of doing well and avoiding evil. This is because Jean seeks forgiveness now that he about to enter a new world where there will be judgment and he is afraid for he wonders if he will be forgiven for the things that he had done while he was in the world. In Metamorphoses, Ovid starts with focusing on how the earth was formed and the things which took place. He divides these seasons into…

    • 2087 Words
    • 9 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    Jawlensky completed the painting in 1917, in the midst of World War I. The turmoil of the war around him may have played a role in the creation of this painting. Niobe, was a Greek symbol who would boast about her fourteen children to everyone she would encounter. When Leto, another Greek female symbol, was exposed to Niobe’s boasting, she sent her two sons, Apollo and Artemis, to kill Niobe’s seven daughters and seven sons. Amphion, Niobe’s husband commits suicide after hearing the news of the deaths of his children leaving Niobe all alone. After this she is changed into stone, and flew, carried by a gust of wind; to her home in Lydia where she was stuck onto the peak of a mountain and is still there weeping. Jawlensky choosing to portray Niobe, a weeping widow, during this time where many people were being killed and many women themselves were becoming weeping widows was a strategic gambit to gain sympathy and attraction to his…

    • 929 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Initially, the idea that Odysseus, a fully grown Greek man, could go through a process of maturation seems almost ludicrous. What is truly ludicrous, however, is the idea that a man could go through all of the trials Odysseus encounters and not be changed. This discussion of Odysseus' journey to maturity, then, it is certainly not in terms of a child maturing into adulthood, rather, it outlines how Odysseus becomes a wiser, more polished, and fulfilled adult character, and how the metaphor of the dawn parallels this journey in multiple ways.…

    • 953 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Catullus 64 Analysis

    • 340 Words
    • 2 Pages

    This section of Catullus’ poem describes how Ariadne transforms and, in a way, matures after seeing Theseus. The poem describes Ariadne, before having seen Theseus, as a “uirgo regia,” a royal virgin. More so, she is said to have been “in molli complexu matris alebat,” or reared in her mother’s care. Furthermore, she is compared to the river Eurotas and the colored petals of blooming flowers in spring. This portrayal of the early Ariadne gives the reader a sense of the easy, carefree life Ariadne had been living her whole life; she was royalty, and always kept under her mother’s care. Ariadne, as a result, had not a worry in the world. Catullus in turn also lets the reader know that she is still very innocent and emotionally immature.…

    • 340 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    In Ovid’s Metamorphoses, the reader is faced with a wide array of transformation of humans to objects, plants and animals and also the seasonal transformation due to the emotions of the Gods’. Too most of us today, the changing of the seasons is due to the rotation of the earth around the sun. In Ovid’s Metamorphoses, the changing of the season are shown to be due to the emotions of Ceres, and this changing of the season is one such transformation due to the emotion of a God. Ceres is angry over the loss of her daughter, Proserpina, to Dis, (also know as Pluto or Hades, King of the Dead), her anger causes devastation to the land by droughts, floods and other natural disasters. Ceres anger can be explained as a mother’s grief over the loss of her child but it also shows selfishness in her at having to share what is hers.…

    • 1088 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Ovid: the Art of Love

    • 1633 Words
    • 7 Pages

    Ovid seems like a man who has a well-built resume of being familiar with women as well as learned from other stories. The majority things he said in the book I am already familiar with and while I was reading I laughed at how time affects this topic very little.…

    • 1633 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Ovid's decision to make myth the dominant subject of the Metamorphoses was influenced by the predisposition of Alexandrian poetry.[4] However, whereas it served in that tradition as the cause for moral reflection or insight, he made it instead the "object of play and artful manipulation".[4] The model for a collection of metamorphosis myths derived from a pre-existing genre of metamorphosis poetry in the Hellenistic tradition, of which the earliest known example is Boio(s)' Ornithogonia — a now-fragmentary poem collecting myths about the metamorphoses of humans into birds.[5]…

    • 179 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Ovid's Metamorphoses

    • 1106 Words
    • 5 Pages

    All of Ovid's tales involve metamorphoses, but some stories (Phaethon (Book 2), Pentheus (Book3), and Heracles (Book 9)) only have metamorphosis tacked on as a casual element, almost as an afterthought. Ovid seems to be more interested in metamorphosis as a universal principal which explains the nature of the world: Troy falls, Rome rises. Nothing is permanent. The chronological progression of the poem is also disorganized. Ovid begins his poem with the story of creation and the flood, and ends in his own day with Augustus on the throne. However, chronology becomes unimportant in…

    • 1106 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Letóna found this very repulsive and even more disrespectful for a mortal to disregard an immortal. This part of story is when their mother summons my two new favorite deities, Diana and Apollo. This family theme resonates with me. If someone in my family was slandered and greatly disrespected, I would try to find a solution to their problem like Diana and Apollo. These deities knew that they were going to punish a mortal for not respecting and demeaning their immortal mother. The theme that “might is right” is common so far in these mythology stories. I enjoy the angle that Ovid takes that the gods are charge and the mortals should know it. Níobe does not know her place compared to deities. Apollo and Artemis team and punish a mother in the most atrocious way possible in killing all her children. My reaction to Apollo killing all the boys first is the he wanted to get rid of the lineage of her family starting with the males. I absolutely dumbfounded that Níobe was not willing to admit Latóna’s superiority and claimed she still had more children than her. Then it became a killing frenzy when Diana takes over by rapidly killing all the girls of Níobe. Both of the deities using their majestic bow and arrows were thrilling when Ovid was describing it. Then I thought about how the human trait of remorse finally sprouted from Níobe when all but one her children remain. The most hair-raising part of the story is that Níobe turned to stone yet her tears continuously trickle down her face. These reactions were all derived from this story of a mortal queen Nióbe’s disdain and the deities of Diana, Apollo, and Letóna making a example of an arrogant…

    • 629 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    This poem by Ovid tells the story of a boy who fell in love with his own reflection on the water. Narcissus is a free verse. It does not follow a particular stanza form and meter and does not have a regular rhythmic pattern. The first stanza of the poem provides us with a picture of the fountain where Narcissus always goes to stare at his reflection. The second stanza gives us the physical attributes of Narcissus. With similes and metaphors, Ovid lets us see what the pretty boy looks like.…

    • 371 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Better Essays

    Frankenstein Vs Odyssey

    • 989 Words
    • 4 Pages

    Stories that are told by a powerful character can provide vital information and be a major source of characterization. These stories, more specifically: embedded narratives, serve as a tool frequently used by authors. Embedded narratives have the ability to change a character immensely, from a boring blank canvas to someone that is intricate, perplexing and intriguing. This is exactly what Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein and Homer’s Odyssey Book Nine: In the One-Eyed Giant’s Cave do, they both utilize embedded narratives to depict the tales of two men: Frankenstein and Odysseus, and what we learn from these tales immensely shapes our depiction of these characters.…

    • 989 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    Yeah

    • 1010 Words
    • 5 Pages

    Horace’s lyric poetry comprises his seventeen Epodes, and 103 Odes in four books. The former, which include some of his early work, are on a variety of political and satirical themes, with a few love poems. Most are written…

    • 1010 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    The Wanderer and The Seafarer belong to elegies, which are ´the most subjective and emotional part of Anglo-Saxon poetry being otherwise much restrained in real feeling and emotion´ . The word elegy is derived from ´the Greek elegos meaning funeral song´ and like all elegies both poems are full of melancholy, mournful mood. The influence of christianity, which penetrated into Anglo-Saxon society in the sixth and seventh century, is evident in both poems. I decided for the analysis of these two poems because they deal with suffering and I wanted to learn how other people, in this case Wanderer and Seafarer, perceive life while suffering and how they solve their misery. This essay will concentrate on the comparison of the poems in terms of these issues: impact of society on heroes, their relation to God,fate, their attitude towards life on Earth, their perception and reaction to suffering. This aim will be achieved by the analysis of poetic images, explaining metaphors and other poetic devices. Old English poetry contains both religious and heroic elements , the reason for that fact is that ´while the Anglo-Saxons adapted themselves readily to the ideals of Christianity, they did not do so without adapting Christianity to their own heroic ideal´ . So the hypothesis is that both poems present mixture of heroic and religious elements.…

    • 2366 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Better Essays