Students will read in Latin from the "Metamorphoses," Ovid's great un-epic epic, in which he recounts myths of shape-changes from the creation of the world down to his own time and that of the emperor Augustus. Ovid's stories are fun, funny, dreadful, silly, serious, and frivolous all at the same time, and deal with issues like divinity, power, love, rape, and identity, all in classic versions of famous myths influential throughout the centuries. The class will focus on developing a feel for Latin style and the Roman poetic tradition, and on both the myths themselves and how Ovid arranges them into an effective narrative. The course will include an introduction to Latin meter, and class discussion will address modern critical approaches to Ovid (perhaps including newly developed online commentaries and databases). |