I Get By With a Little Help From My Friends: Ovid, Ex Ponto II.iii.41-49

While in exile, the poet Ovid reaches out for help: 

 Cerne quid Aeacides post mortem praestet amico:

     instar et hanc uitam mortis habere puta.

Pirithoum Theseus Stygias comitauit ad undas:

     a Stygia quantum mors mea distat aqua?

Adfuit insano iuuenis Phoceus Orestae: 

     et mea non minimum culpa furoris habet.

Tu quoque magnorum laudes admitte uirorum,

     ut facis, et lapso quam potes adfer opem.

--Ovid, Ex Ponto II.3.41-49

Consider how Achilles honored his “friend” Patroclus when he died, 

and remember that this life of mine is a living death!

Theseus accompanied Pirithous to the Underworld:

How far off is my death from the Stygian waves?

Pylades supported Orestes through his mental crisis,

My troubles have given me no less a crisis.

Maximus, accept the same praise that these heroes received,

And keep doing what you are doing,

helping me however you can while my life is in ruins.

OVID

MAP:

Name: Publius Ovidius Naso  

Date:  43 BCE – 18 CE

Works:  Ars Amatoria

               Metamorphoses*

              Tristia, etc.

 

REGION  1

BIO:

Timeline:

Ovid was one of the most famous love poets of Rome’s Golden Age. His most famous work, the Metamorphoses, provides a history of the world through a series of interwoven myths. Most of his poetry is erotic in nature; for this reason, he fell into trouble during the conservative social reforms under the reign of the emperor Augustus. In 8 CE he was banished to Bithynia, where he spent the remainder of his life pining for his native homeland.

 GOLDEN AGE ROME