I took week 3 as an opportunity to continue my reading from last week and build on the knowledge I accumulated through last week’s readings. Last week, I read and enjoyed Ovid I. This week, Ovid II was on my agenda. While Ovid I had more helpful notes at the beginning and less individual stories, I have to say I liked Ovid II better.
In my opinion, Ovid II had better stories overall. To me, a large part of the stories in Ovid I felt more like ‘set the stage’ stories while the stories in Ovid II felt more developed. Most of them made sense as freestanding stories.
Like last week, I did all of the readings in one sitting. It’s easier for me this way, and once I get going, it doesn’t usually take too long. Again, there was some name-switching going on (Proserpine was also referred to as Persephone, Diana was also referred to as Artemis, etc.), but it wasn’t terribly distracting. I have some familiarity with mythology, so I was able to keep things straight for the most part.
One misgiving I had about this unit was how a sloppy attempt was made to tie many of the stories into one another. More often that not, this just meant tossing in a lot of unnecessary names and not really accomplishing much of anything.
These stories had a lot going on, and I enjoyed most of them. There was a lot of action. The only one I remember distinctly not liking was the story of Marsyas. I didn’t understand it and didn’t see the point of it. It was really short and I think it needed a little more backstory to make sense. Why was he killed and why did it have to be in such a gruesome way? I’m not sure??
(Apollo and Marsyas painting in the Louvre, Wikimedia Commons)
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