In this week’s Dispatches from The Secret Library, Dr Oliver Tearle analyses the lasting power of Ovid’s great poem Ovid’s wasn’t the first Metamorphoses. Before him, there was Nicander’s Heteroeumena, whose title is usually translated as ‘metamorphoses’, but Nicander’s poem has been lost. It was Ovid’s vast retelling of the […]
In this week’s Dispatches from The Secret Library, Dr Oliver Tearle ponders the curious story of Philomela the nightingale from classical myth The story of Philomela is well-known. But a quick reminder never hurts, so here’s the story: Tereus … marries Procne, the daughter of Pandion. Tereus coming a second […]
Interesting facts about a classic Roman poet 1. Ovid wrote a tragedy about Medea, but it has not survived. This is particularly galling since the Roman rhetorician Quintilian thought this among Ovid’s finest work – and this is a poet who also gave us the fantastic (in more ways than […]