Kalliope’s Comments (group member since Aug 28, 2018)

Kalliope’s comments from the Ovid's Metamorphoses and Further Metamorphoses group.

One more comment from Simpson.

He draws attention to the fact that Arethusa's story is one of the few narrated in first person (it seems there are a total of six such stories), and this one is more peculiar because the narrator is the victim and in so is the only one in the whole book.

Elena wrote: "Ovid's origin stories have to be some of the most vivid of the genre. Not all, but certainly many of them have a kind of consolation built in, when devastating emotions like fear of rape, or mourni..."

The Daphne story is one of my favourites...

Roger wrote: "Totally off topic, Kalliope, but my I have recently been watching the television show El Ministerio del Tiempo with my son, who is practicing his Spanish. Do you know it? The theme is time-travel: ..."

Ah, yes, I have seen a couple of the episodes. They are humorous. The series has been successful.

I posted in Books II and III on the documentary on Michelangelo that I saw today. Excellent as the one on Bernini on which I have already commented.

Both different. The one on MA goes through his whole life.

The Bernini was excellent because it focused on the pieces that he made for the Borghese gallery. We are lucky that they are still there and we can see them for the place and in the setting for which they were sculpted. That is not the case with the majority of works we now see in Museums - completely uprooted.

Peter wrote: "A small note on the side: I am simultaneously reading Dead Souls by Nikolai Gogol and was delighted to see him relate to Ovid. In chapter 3 he mentions that the totally different behaviour of Russi..."

Oh, that is a book I wanted to read, Peter. Thank you... I also see Ovidian elements all over the place lately..

In Book Two I have just posted a Bacchus by Michelangelo. It was shown on a documentary on the genius that I saw today: Michelangelo, Love and Death.

The other Ovidian work is absolutely exquisite Phaeton. He did more than one drawing but the one shown in the film is the one in the Royal Collection and is from 1533.




Their website has more information on the work.


https://www.rct.uk/collection/912766/...

I saw today the following documentary on Michelangelo. It was very good.


https://www.imdb.com/title/tt7055784/... the work shown were two Ovidian, which I will post in the corresponding books.

One is his Bacchus - in marble.

Michelangelo. 1496. Bargello, Florence.



There is something striking, and slightly disturbing, in his expression.

Another point on the partisan judgement on the contest between the Muses and the magpies...

The judges were nymphs, and most of the rapes in the Met are inflicted on nymphs.

Calliope's song would have to appeal to the nymphs.

Another point in the Simpson, although the idea comes from Patricia Johnson.

Calliope's (Ovid's) version of the Proserpina is different from others, in that she attributes the cause of the whole episode entirely to Cupid.

And I quote:

"Rome in general and the Julian family in particular were closely identified with Venus though her son Aeneas, whom the Julians thought of as the founder of their line."

Simpson thinks this is more of a parody rather than a straight critique of Augustan politics (at least in this episode). There are several direct parallels again with the Aeneid (Venus addressing Cupid - similar to the same with the Dido story in the Aeneid).

Roman Clodia wrote: "Kalliope wrote: "For his contemporaries it may have been as fun to listen to"
..."

I am glad you liked my idea of the Cinderella mix. I was fearing boos...

And I am trying to imagine now Rubens depicting Mary Poppins going up in the air.

:)

Peter wrote: "A rather unusual painting of disembodied Perseus reminding of John the Baptist and thus bridging classical Greek to Christian motives.


Odilon Redon: Head of Perseus (1875, Kröller-Müller Museum, ..."

Very interesting, Peter. I had not seen it before. And yes, curious mixing of traditions.

Sorry, I meant ‘read’. I am aware that this was a text and not oral accounts like Homer.

Roman Clodia wrote: "we have to have a good sense of what Ovid's originary text is saying in order to see what later receptions are doing with and to it. .."

I agree with this, and find myself wanting to understand more the transformations that Ovid did to the various myths. The convolution itself is part of the weaving, and this is something I am trying to focus on, to the way he manages the transitions and leaps.

For his contemporaries it may have been as fun to listen to as we now had someone stringing together stories that are very familiar to us already - lets say someone joining the stories of Cinderella with Hansel & Gretel with Moby Dick with Mary Poppins with Romeo & Juliet (which he does..) etc...

You probably will think I am going too far..

I did like this book.. I did not mind the battle at the beginning, I can well see that it is a parody even if the Romans loved watching violence. I particularly liked the second part of the battle turning into a sculpture gallery.

And then the convoluted structure, like Russian dolls, of Minerva and the Muses and magpies with the ambivalent character of Proserpina, the sting at the Olympian gos, and the evocation of Sicily which makes me want to go to the island...

I am enjoying both the text itself, even if I cannot read it in Latin, and of course all the further transformations.

I am looking forward to Book VI which we will probably begin next Monday.

Another theme, or feature, I am tracking is the power of the Olympian gods.

They come across as rather limited. Each one of them has a couple of strengths, but once out of their specific field of power, they are powerless.

I will post more of this in the Thread of each specific book.

In this one we have the Pierides account of the Olympians behaving rather cowardly when Typhoeus challenged them. They fled and took disguises when hiding.

How reliable are the Pierides? Are they lying and is that why the Nymphs judged in favour or the Muses. Or are they telling truths that should not be told?

Very ambiguous this Ovid.

Simpson draws also attention to the parallel and contrast between the magpies and the Muses. There are a total nine in both lots, so we can see in their competition how the human and the divine 'specialists' in poetry confront their respective abilities (later something similar with Minerva herself and Arachne).

But this competition is in itself a narrative of narratives and Minerva cannot be a fair judge. For one the competition has already taken place, and two the account is biased -- since it is told by one side only (the winners).

Elena wrote: "Thanks so much for the guide, I felt as though I was lost in the labyrinth...Homer reveled in embedded narratives, but nothing this complex...I wonder how the ancient audience understood Ovid's tou..."

Well, we are in a labyrinth, and that is part of the interest. As Ovid's contemporary readers would have been a great deal more familiar with the individual stories than the majority of us are, the way he interlaced them together could have been one of the major attractive points.

There is something of the magician pulling myths out of his hat... So, yes, to the acrobatic performance you say.

On the singing of Magpies.. I had no clue about this, so I looked for their songs.

Here is one sample.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oYEYc...

Not quite a nightingale.

For Typhoeus, taken out of the Ovidian context and put in a very different one, is Klimt's scene as part of this Beethoven frieze in the Secession Building in Vienna from 1901.

The monster Typhoeus has his Gorgon daughters, or goddesses of fate, at the left (his right). Over them we have Sickness, Craziness and Death. On the right (the monster's left) there are Lust, Unchastity and Gluttony.

This edition also has seen a tripartite structure in the whole of the Met (I may have to come back to this later on, since I read a while ago).

The first part would be devoted to the Gods and goes from the beginning to Book V. The Perseus episode serves as a transition to the second part which is devoted to Heroes and Heroines.

The second part will have a similar transition with the Orpheus episode in Book XI, to the third part dedicated, I think, to humans.