Ovid

Ovid, full name Publius Ovidius Naso, was a Roman poet born in 43 BCE in Sulmo (now Sulmona) in the Italian region of Abruzzo. He became one of the leading literary figures of the Augustan age, renowned for his elegant Latin, inventive mythmaking, and mastery of elegiac, didactic, and narrative verse. He published several influential works early in his career, gaining fame in literary circles and at the imperial court.

Ovid’s early collections, often grouped under the umbrella of his Amores, include Amores (Love), a sequence of witty, often ironic love lyrics; Ars Amatoria (The Art of Love), a didactic poem offering guidance on romantic pursuit; and Remedia Amoris (The Cure for Love), a companion that treats love’s pains with humor and irony. These works established his distinctive blend of humor, grace, and sharp observation.

His best-known work, Metamorphoses, is a long narrative poem in hexameters that draws on Greek and Roman myths to tell stories of transformation, shaping much of later Western art and literature. He also began Fasti, a comprehensive verse calendar of Roman religious festivals, though it remained unfinished after his exile. Later in life, Ovid was banished from Rome by Emperor Augustus in 8 CE to Tomis on the Black Sea, for reasons that remain uncertain; traditional accounts mention a mysterious “carmen et error” (a poem and a mistake). He died around 17 or 18 CE, having produced poetry that continued to influence writers for centuries.

Ovid’s legacy lies in his skillful fusion of myth, intimacy, and irony, his lucid Latin style, and the enduring resonance of Metamorphoses in the Western literary tradition.