Week 4 — Books 6 & 7

[Susan]

Week 4

Book 6 includes: Arachne, Niobe, Latona & the Lycian Peasants, Marsyas, Pelops; Tereus, Procne, Philomela; Boreas & Orithyia

Book 7 includes: The Story of Medea & Jason, War Between Crete and Athens; the Plague and the Myrmidons; Cephalus and Procris.

What a week of reading! Here are a couple of my questions. Please add yours.

1). Ovid’s psychology throughout seems on target, but why can’t Niobe stop bragging?

2) And what motivates Medea as her story continues and her actions get more malevolent?

[Susan]

This past week, I’ve been reading Dante’s Paradiso which is filled with references to Ovid’s myths. Here are a tercet that refers to Marsyas, where Dante is asking for Apollo’s help in writing the poem: “Enter my breast, and breathe in me/ as when you drew out Marsyas/ out from the sheathing of his limbs.” Kind of a creepy image if you ask me

[Alexey]

Particularly, when asking for help, this is not the one I'd like to recall. In this week reading, there are stories which is quite ugly even in the context of the previous not so gentle stories.

[Mike]

Ovid gives an overview of Medea, I think her early life is portrayed a conflicted teenage girl, overwhelmed by divine love (Eros), later I would say she is betrayed and is possessed by rage (Electra like). After reading this section I was planning on reading the other classical literature on Medea.

[Lily]

Having access to Hoopla and Libby (online reading applications, provided where I live by the library services taxpayer provided), I will sometimes peruse related (or not so related) books on a whim -- books,..., I may find when looking for another. I know the title I share below "breaks" the foundational mantra of this board: read the original. But I dare to share it because helped provide me a broader contextual sense of Ovid: the world into which he brought his erudite writing, thoughts about both that time in history and their influence on the history of humankind that followed. (Ovid even lived in those years somewhat overlapping those of (St.) Paul's letters.) Education and social position helped Ovid's words become known and accessible among sophisticated layers of Roman society: Llewelyn Morgan, Ovid: A Very Short Introduction. The book also touches upon influences of Ovid's genius on later generations of writers/thought.

(I have been using such ready access to so many sources in some fun and new (for me) ways -- sometimes bypassing most of a listen to dip into broader or narrower topics -- e.g., historical evolution of law power versus ruler power in ordering civilizations.)

[Ian]

Note on Arachne: in immediately pre-industrial England weaving was a skill also associated with men (leading to a crisis of subsistence when mechanical looms replaced their highly skilled labor), but in classical civilizations wool-working was women’s work: even for the upper classes, whose slaves also took part in the labor.

By tradition, the virtuous matron always had at hand wool to spin into thread, if she wasn’t working at a loom. This assumption figures in the story of the Rape of Lucretia, who is discovered weaving instead of socializing while her husband is away at war. Mary Renault’s “The Persian Boy” contains a scene in which Alexander the Great says that his mother and sister wove the clothes he is wearing. And then there is Penelope and the shroud of Laertes, at the very basis of Hellenic culture.

So Arachne starts off with good marks as a nearly ideal woman.

[Susan]

Alexey wrote: "Particularly, when asking for help, this is not the one I'd like to recall. In this week reading, there are stories which is quite ugly even in the context of the previous not so gentle stories."

Yes. Tereus, Procne, and Philomena and Medea made me think of contemporary true crime stories — without transformation. I’m not sure the transformation makes the stories less ugly

[Susan]

Mike wrote: "Ovid gives an overview of Medea, I think her early life is portrayed a conflicted teenage girl, overwhelmed by divine love (Eros), later I would say she is betrayed and is possessed by rage (Electr..."

I agree she is initially motivated by love, but I’m not sure why she decides to murder Pelias. The only explanation for why she heads to Pelias’ palace is “That fraud might have its day in full, Medea/ pretended that she’d quarreled with her husband,/ and fled, a suppliant, to Pelias’ palace.” Maybe the readers are expected to be familiar with these details of the story? Reading the classical literature on Medea sounds like an interesting project; she’s quite the character!

[Ian]

Yes, readers were expected to be familiar with the outlines of the story: but it had many variants, as described conveniently in her Wikipedia article. If one treats the death of Pelias as a continuation of the “Argonautica” by Apollonius of Rhodes, which Ovid knew well, Medea is probably acting out of the consuming love for Jason imposed on her by Aphrodite at Hera’s instigation. Eliminating the usurper Pelias would make Jason king — so long as the people weren’t too upset by the murder. (A more negative view of the character would attribute her actions to her desire to be queen to Jason as king, but I don’t think that is spelled out in the classical sources.)

[Chris]

I have been off the grid for a week and am now in the catch-up mode. I definitely was confused on the motivation of Medea's deception that led to the death of Pelias. I'm sure I missed something. She had demonstrated the ability to turn back the aging process but the with Pelias she deceives his daughters into being the instruments of his death.

Overall, I was taken by the incredible violence in this section and that it seemed no virgin would be left untouched by the gods. Rape seemed to be the order of the day. Sheesh! Ovid certainly is able to continue to use these stories to illustrate various transformations or metamorphoses as the title implies.

[Ian]

Re-reading I was impressed by the amount of violence Ovid put in. Looking back a bit, the account of Perseus’ battle for the hand of Andromeda was quite drawn out, in full epic style, as though to show that the poet could match Homer and Virgil. He then continues to pile on the gore in the stories he selects for the following books.

[Kay]

Ian wrote: "Re-reading I was impressed by the amount of violence Ovid put in. Looking back a bit, the account of Perseus’ battle for the hand of Andromeda was quite drawn out, in full epic style, as though to ..."

I agree. The 2 most 'violent' pieces are the ones that have stood out for me the most. It's definitely the wedding battle (me, trying to figure out why he was carrying Medusa's head around for he obviously couldn't show it off but it came in really handy). I've just read Tereus and Philomela (leaving a verb out). This tale is so hard core both in the crime and the revenge.