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Delahoyde & Hughes
Orpheus
OVID
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Invocation:
"Of bodies changed to other forms I tell;
Ovid announces his theme of change, but not his purpose. This is
similar to the typical poor essay that includes in the opening
paragraph, "In this paper I will [examine the origin of Zeus, or
whatever]" and proceeds to report factoids instead of work towards
supporting any kind of real thesis or perspective. But Ovid, unlike
that obtuse writer, knows what he's doing. It remains for us to
determine what this unspoken purpose is.
Ovid invokes "the gods," but the invocation is minimal, weird, and
ambiguous. Instead of begging for inspiration and humbly praising
the higher powers, he says rather bluntly, that the gods "Will help
me -- or so I hope" (Ovid 3). Given what he will say about these
higher powers in the next pages, this is not much of an assurance.
The Creation:
"Chaos, a raw and undivided mass,
The difference in perspectives between Ovid and the author(s) of Genesis
most pronouncedly includes the emphasis on the creator Himself in Genesis
vs. the emphasis on the creation in Metamorphoses, the separation
of elements; and Ovid goes so far as to blur the issue of the creator,
attributing the work ambivalently to "God, or kindlier Nature" or
"whatever god it was" (2), "with nature's blessing" (1). He has no
religious ax to grind, so Ovid's view is more worldly. But what happens
when you remove the creator from the story? Emphasis falls onto what?
And why is Ovid doing this?
According to Ovid, the creation is an ending of strife between innately
warring opposites, parallel to the Chaos of Genesis. This underlying
strife characterizes Western thought, and one is less likely to see this
elemental instability in the creation myths of other cultures. In fact,
Ovid's account on this score is more "scientific" than Genesis and apt to
sound more familiar to us.
Also interesting are the details in Ovid; he sees the earth as a giant
ball and he even gives us an account of the hemispheres, including a
sense of global climate. He knows about the existence of both poles. What
do you make of this? In other words, what happened to the history lesson
where Columbus sailed the ocean blue in 1492? Didn't most of the people
in the European world in 1492 suspect that the earth was flat? So was
this information in Ovid's account added later? Is there any evidence?
Or did Roman intellectuals know the reality of earth as planet, and
we're simply in the habit of shortchanging the ancient world?
Rebellion in the form of the battle between the Titans and Olympians
brings about the first degradation from gold to silver, then human
disposition towards war brings about the bronze age, and then a ravaging
of the earth's bowels for iron. Ultimately, the human race relishes
"cruelty, / Bloodshed and outrage" (6).
The Flood:
Jove (Zeus) overthrew his father Saturn (Cronos), so humankind was not
responsible for the first wave of degradation exactly, as Ovid may be
hinting. The gods lament the extinction of humans, for "Who would cense
their shrines?" (8). Jove promises a better race and considers a fire
apocalypse, but a general prophecy about end-times has him decide
instead on a deluge. Ovid interestingly personalizes the flood with
colorful perversions of the natural order: fish in the tops of elm
trees, etc.
(12).
The wrath of god yields nearly genocidal flood, and one couple --
Deucalion and Pyrrha -- is saved. That sounds somewhat familiar. But
in the aftermath of the flood, Ovid departs from Genesis; the biblical
story gives us the covenant -- the promise inherent in the image of
the rainbow. In Ovid's story, Deucalion and Pyrrha find themselves
alone. They pray to Themis, daughter of Gaia, and she gives them an
answer of sorts on how to redeem humankind -- it comes in the form
of a riddle: "cast behind you your great mother's bones" (12). What
are the bones of the great mother?
"The earth is our great mother and the stones / Within earth's body
surely are the bones / The oracle intends" (12). If this is taken simply
as the answer to the riddle, the result will be the same blindness
Oedipus experienced in answering the riddle of the Sphinx simply as
if it were a trivial Jeopardy question. Etiologically speaking, since
we are born of stones, "Hence we are hard, we children of the earth"
(13).
Then there's some spontaneous generation out of "slime and ooze," so
that the world seethes with all forms of life like a WalMart on a
Saturday afternoon. We hear about Apollo slaying the Python.
Apollo and Daphne:
Etymology: the laurel (more familiar as "bay") is sacred to Apollo,
the god of lyric and other poetic creation. The victors in athletic
contests and renowned poets of many societies have been honored with
a laurel wreath. The title "poet laureate" comes from Latin poeta
laureatus, meaning "poet honored with laurel."
Jove and Io:
We get a story within the story -- Juno's distrust leads to her
appointing hundred-eyed Argus as guard over Io the cow. Jove, though,
sends Mercury to tell stories to Argus, such as the tale of Pan and
Syrinx, the origin of reeds -- involving more victimization. When
Argus dozes, he is decapitated. And we get an etiology: how the
peacock came by its (Argus') "eyes." When Jove promises Juno that
he's over Io, she gets changed back to her human form. So we're all
good, right?
Why doesn't Ovid end Book 1 here and begin the story of Phaethon
at the start of Book 2?! Why is he messing with our logical
expectations?
Final Questions:
What is the worldview manifested in Metamorphoses? The
"metamophoses" themselves are dehumanizing: Lycaon to a wolf,
Daphne to a tree, Syrinx to reeds.... And the stories so far
mostly seem to involve arbitrary victimization: surely being a
tree is not Daphne's dream come true; Io was changed back, but
was toyed with cruelly -- through any fault of her own? Was
Argus' fate justified?
You gods, who have yourselves wrought every change,
Inspire my enterprise and lead my lay
In one continuous song from nature's first
Remote beginnings to our modern times" (1.1-5)
The Four Ages:
Naught but lifeless bulk, with warring seeds
Of ill-joined elements compressed together" (1.9-11).
Lycaon:
There's no reverential attitude towards the Olympian gods, but either
a lighthearted one or maybe even critical. Jove is a philanderer: he
always was in the myths but he seems especially cheesy here, perhaps
because of the contrast with the pathos inherent in Io's experience
-- he "stayed her flight and ravished her" (19) -- especially her
futile attempts to communicate when in her cow form, transformed
by Jove to hide her from Juno. She scrapes her name in the dirt for
her father to recognize who she is (20).
Ovid Index
Orpheus: Roman Mythology