The Metamorphoses: a New Verse Translation (Penguin Classics)

Surprisingly engaging - I liked it more than I thought I would.

interested in the legends/story of creation but a bit too heavy for me.

Ovid's epic poem covers over 200 stories of people who were changed in various ways, mostly because they pissed off the gods, in one way or another. In some cases, the punishments were deserved, but in many others we see how human-like the gods really are. For example, every single young virgin raped by Jove was turned into an animal by his jealous wife, Juno. Sheesh, talk about...more

Ovid's epic poem covers over 200 stories of people who were changed in various ways, mostly because they pissed off the gods, in one way or another. In some cases, the punishments were deserved, but in many others we see how human-like the gods really are. For example, every single young virgin raped by Jove was turned into an animal by his jealous wife, Juno. Sheesh, talk about blaming the victim... I have read excerpts of this before, but this is the first time I had tackled the whole thing all at once. Charles Martin's translation does a pretty good job of capturing the wit and playfulness of the original. College bound? Consider giving this a go.   hide

The parts we had to study were pretty good actually. It's a poem about the ancient myths written by Ovid (who was expelled from the kingdom). Each story carries a different theme with Metamorphoses, generally the secondary theme being either love, family or war.