that favourable winds grant you an easy passage: I hear uncertain cries and I think that every noise. Night was falling – indeed I remember the pleasure of it –. She implores aid for your Minyae. You can’t deny the fact, as the goddess is my witness. What herbs and what medicines did my nurse not bring to me, applying them with bold hand to drive forth entirely from my bosom – this was the only secret we kept from you – the burden that was increasing there! On this I look, and hold it to my heart in place of my real lord, and complain to it, as if it could speak again. just like your apple was, I recall to mind. And I’m troubled no less by last night’s dream. Chalciope. You were worthy of me if anyone was, you, more justly. the power of Pallas’s gift’s contemptible to me. Your Sestos should take me, or my Abydos you: your land pleases me, as much as mine pleases you. When will it be mine to have you again close joined to me on the same couch, telling me your glorious deeds in the field? so that my name would always be on men’s lips? as Hippomenes took Atalanta, Schoeney’s daughter, in the race. Often I look to see if your footprints might mark the shore. Indeed I doubt that too, not because assurance is lacking. 11. If you ask you’ll find Electra the Pleiad, and Jove in my line. Surely, something comes from a life with savage winds; his temper is like that of his subjects. In the twenty-one poems of the Heroides, Ovid gave voice to the heroines and heroes of epic and myth. Phyllis to Demophoon 3. lacks credibility as an excuse, through the lengthy delay. you worship in the temple that shares our knowledge: the gods don’t delight in sacrificial oxen. Three times I’ve left my clothes on the dry sands: three times, naked, painfully, I’ve tried to swim the roads: the swollen sea opposed my youthful undertaking. Though I do everything, though I burn sacred incense to Diana, she still takes your part more than is right, and as you want it. Ovid, Heroides and Amores - Ovid, Heroides and Amores. [65] Of Hector, whoe’er he be, if I am dear to you, be ware; keep his name stamped in ever mindful heart! Without delay, his passion was turned from him, and fled from his tenacious breast, and Deucalion was freed from the fires of love. But you were swept headlong hence; and the wind that invited forth your sails was one your seamen longed for, not I; it was a wind suited to seamen, not to one who loved. torn limb from limb on thy day of birth; O my son, miserable pledge of my unhallowed love – this was the first of days for thee, and this for thee the last. [5] Perhaps, too, you may ask why my verses alternate, when I am better suited to the lyric mode. If I’d seen you, you’d have been first among the thousand: my husband himself will pardon my opinion. What you touch is to be mine: If you do that, shortly, you’ll be an adulterer. [41] Yet, when I read you my songs, I seemed already beautiful enough; you swore ‘twas I alone whom speech forever graced. and also that proud mother, Niobe, her body rising as rock. I might indeed retain your good regard as before. Ovid: The Metamorphoses: a new complete downloadable English translation with comprehensive index, and other poetry translations including Baudelaire , Chinese, European . but he draws nothing from Ulysses’s race, that you mistrust. Canace to Macareus I’ll suffer, if the suffering’s granted its prize. I felt the whole of both cheeks had reddened. 7. Since I suspect your noble cheeks. Its flame shines forth its own betrayer. The limbs I saved, a wanton now embraces; ‘tis she who reaps the fruit of my toil. Why exult in your words if they deceived me. Ah me! The earth can scarcely sustain so many people. Your lover’s almost been led to you, by his hand: use your husband’s mandate in all innocence! in the way good men do, not to ruin hope by fraud: better if winning by entreaty had been yours, and not snatching. She will give him his arms, and the while she gives him arms will receive his kisses – a kind of office sweet to both – and will lead her husband forth, and lay on him the command to return, and say: “See that you bring once more those arms to Jove!” He, bearing fresh in mind with him the command of his mistress, will fight with caution, and be mindful of his home. On the one hand was love, on the other, fear; and fear increased my very love. Kept close in the palace am I, bound with heavy chains; and the cause of my punishment is that I was faithful. The hapless babe broke forth in wailings – you would have thought he understood – and with what utterance he could entreated his grandsire. 11. Your body’s fitter for Venus than Mars. My head would have been severed from my blood-stained neck. Perhaps as I gazed at this, I was gazed at by you, Acontius. but these straits are usually safer for men. he swiftly carried Medea away from Phasis, in his ship: When Paris, of Ida, once came as an adulterer to Sparta. I would sing to you, I remember – for lovers remember all – and while I snag you stole kisses from me. so I am afraid of those other two, if your boast is true. But I, alas, am so wretched! Yards are added to masts, and receive the hanging shrouds. She is already near the threshold – my father’s ears have caught the crying sound, and the babe is lost, betrayed by his own sign! Make us more, gliding through the defeated waves. Just before dawn, when the lamp was sinking. I’ve been disturbed, as the troubled ocean raged with cruel waves. Do you hope this thoughtless man, my Tyndaris. – and thrust in gaol. No doubt you might be grieved by an omen of my death. 6. – play tricks on my husband! 5. If you gave your daughter, Hermione, kisses, I delighted. I’m not sure what I’ll do: it’s a grief to see you. Only trust me: fearlessly departing, with the gods we favour. or the Twins, his brothers-in-law, or Tyndareus? when, a lover, I slipped from my father’s door. Now truly I linger in my city unwillingly. and we wandered with errant feet through the holy place: and now I walk in the colonnades, and now wonder. The joys of that night can no more be counted. – that I hold in my woman’s hand, weapon not meet for me? – and your right hand clasped with mine, moved the heart of the simple maid. virgin, rather than that which the goddess remembers. Would you believe with what difficulty I write this meagre letter. Dragons and maddened bulls, it seems, I could subdue; a man alone I could not; I, who could beat back fierce fire with wise drugs, have not the power to escape the flames of my own passion. What did my offence seek except to be made one with you? an object of indignation, who spread the nets for me. if your every care’s not for your guest. or that my beauty’s not well-known to me, but because credulity’s usually harmful to girls. 21. Another light’s more certain for me: my love. Return to this camp, deserter from mutual love: why should my body be left in the centre of the bed? You’d become at once the author and critic of the offence. Still, be rather as you would be, than as you used to be before, and make your way here safely in a calm sea –. this letter, that I pray, myself, to follow, with the least delay. And why should you have praise, a man cheating a virgin girl? that always betrays itself by its own light? – the bosom, Phaon, of her whom you were wont to praise, and who so often seemed to you to have the gift of genius. Bidden to turn the hitherto untried craft to the shores of Colchis, you set foot in the rich realms of my native land. [15] Boreas came swooping down, seized on and stretched your sails, and my Protesilaus soon was far away. That breast is mine! [1] If aught of what I write is yet blotted deep and escapes your eye, ‘twill be because the little roll has been stained by its mistress’ blood. and, when you think nothing’s more certain, vanishes. Twilight had just settled on the earth; it was the last part of day and the first of night. might be wounded by striking my body so furiously. Oh I wish you would come! Perhaps she’ll even touch you, with her snow-white teeth, bringing you to her lips, when she wishes to break your seal.’. and my innocence was seen to be capable of capture. and I’d pray for the waters never to be calm. All your hopes depend on my living: why should the cruel goddess. kisses, great gods, worth seeking over the sea! For those who were done to death, and for those who did the deed, I weep; as many brothers as I have lost, so many sisters also have I lost.8 Let both their companies receive my tears! Ovid’s Heroides: A New Translation and Critical Essays Paul Murgatroyd , Bridget Reeves , Sarah Parker This volume offers up-to-date translations of all 21 epistles of Ovid's Heroides. Deianira to Hercules 10. If you were so resolved to leave my side, you could have gone in more becoming wise. and snatch you away, borne on my loving breast. EPISTLES 11 - 15. Would that he winds that bear away my words might bring your sails again; this deed were fitting for you, tardy one, had you a feeling breast. Then will I consecrate to Phoebus my shell, our common boon, and under it shall be writ one verse, and a second: Besides this, you are bidden to scatter with obedient hand over the wide fields the seeds that should beget peoples to assail you with weapons born with themselves; a baneful harvest, that, to its own husbandman. I fear everything! It’s true he sailed for Crete with a following wind: but don’t think everything is as you’d wish! Though she held you from going, she could not stop you. Don’t think I divided the waves with my ship carrying goods –. – and by the heavenly Nine who are my deities, I swear to you, when someone said to me: “Your joys are flying from you!” for a long time I could not weep, and could not speak! in ill health, a glorious prize for your skills! Further I blush to tell, but all takes place; I feel the delight, and cannot rule myself. I can pierce with my arrow whatever place you choose. the waters I shouldered parting before me, of themselves. – and with their bodies press the couches that deserve to be funeral beds. and, while I can encircle your neck with my arms. Often I seem with the burden of my neck to press your arms, often to place beneath your neck my arms. You yoke together the bronze-footed bulls with your body unharmed by their fire, and cleave the solid mould with the share as you were bid. Let the brave wage war, you, Paris, always love! I recognize the kisses – close caresses of the tongue – which you were wont to take and wont to give. It’s also I confess your rare beauty: and a girl. and I wish he who caused them might die instead of you! Do I call you back? Why from your lips comes many a complaint? Or that my mother seems suited to you, by whose example, you may think you can sway me too: it’s an error: my mother. But what am I doing? didn’t happen without the counsel and will of the gods. Though you flee some you can’t escape all the nets. The Trojan fleet is here, equipped with arms and men: soon wind and oar could send them on their way. The pains compel my groans, but fear, the nurse, and shame itself forbid. And so, delaying until the nurse’s cross warning. to have been low-born, were signs of my secret nobility. So I, too, should have been torn limb from limb – but with thee! I confess, if my love for you hurts you, I’ll hurt you endlessly. I landed on your shores, bride, scion of Oebalus. I am more vigorous and the shore comes nearer. At the persuasion of Medea, who wished to avenge Jason, they attempted the rejuvenation of their father by dismembering and boiling him in a supposed magic cauldron. of wrestling, or you guide your horse’s neck with a bridle: now you trap a bird, now draw a fish to your hook. Fast and free shipping free returns cash on delivery available on eligible purchase. Often I’d have drowned my passion in wine, but it grew. And I follow the will of the gods, gods you are master of. I repress my groans, and try to take back the words that slip from me, and force myself to drink my very tears. though just, might indeed be called naive. our fate, the aid through which I could be made well again. Now I fear, and am ashamed, though not conscious of any guilt. I take no pleasure in the day; my nights are watches of bitterness, and gentle sleep is far departed from my wretched soul. Fear is itself wrong: I’m confused now. Then did my playful ways delight you more than your wont – the quick embrace, the jest that gave spice to our sport, and, when the joys of both had mingled into one, the deep, deep languor in our wearied frames. That beauty should enjoy copious adornments, without end. be present to me? My genius had its powers from him; with him they were swept away. After the last hand had finished work on the fleet. more than once my drunkenness was feigned. That I might have, in fact, the greetings. now, joined to you, I warm you with my heart. HEROIDES CONTENTS. Let the omens lack reality! I swell with anger and envy – why shouldn’t I tell all –. Thou, Menelaus, who dost grieve o’ermuch for the stolen one, ah me, how many shall shed tears for thy revenge! have deflected me: these might have captured my heart. and the sun desires to unyoke his bright horses. But let your prayer. And I think you might have set out to trap me again, except that. but his swelling wrath he does not rule, and the realms of his possession are less wide than his faults. Why condemn me in my absence? And you won’t concede, nor does he think himself inferior. Where the gods? when you shine out, silver, with clear rays. Heinemann, 1914. I wouldn’t have been masked from my parents, as before. why throw yourself at me? Let both the winds and your tender arms hold me equally. If nature, malign to me, has denied the charm of beauty, weigh in the stead of beauty the genius she gave. I turn back into the temple by its high flight of steps –, An apple was thrown at my feet with this verse on it –. Phaon has swept away all that ye loved before – ah, wretched me, how nearly I came then to saying “my Phaon”! There’s a place in the midst of the valleys of wooded Ida. She woke terrified, and told the fearful vision of deep night. Canace to Macareus but I fear lest your love strays like the wind. but loyalty that’s shown, and needs no witness. That same glory I delight in, as it now is, harms me. he kissed me, saying: ‘Care for the house, and business, and for the Trojan guest.’. Heed the winds that say you nay! 14. – She whom I follow is herself a goddess. And distance creates more fear, for the absent. True you are worthy of the heavens, but linger still on earth. The famous golden ram, sightly for deep flock, is my dowry – the which, should I say to you “Restore it!” you would refuse to render up. why was the ship from the forests of Pelion ever driven over the seas by strong young arms in quest of the ram of Phrixus? Icy though you may be, cruel one, still, can you deny, What joy in plundering would you have known. The joyful house increased, accepting a long lost child.
2020 ovid, heroides translation