In existographies, Ovid (43BC-c.17AD) (IQ:170|#322) (Cattell 1000:117) (CR:26) was an Roman poetical philosopher noted for his 8AD work Metamorphoses, derived from the Greek μεταμορφώσεις, meaning "transformation, transforming", from μετα- (meta-) "change" + μορφή (morphe) "form", one the the first works on morphology, a fifteen-book collection of epic poems, in book three of which he tells the story of Echo and Narcissus—a thematical story said to be embedded in Goethe’s 1809 Elective Affinities, the third part of his metamorphology theory of form change.
Overview
In 8AD, Ovid, in his Metamorphosis, explains the explains the origin of life, i.e. non-human life, according to a warm pond model stylized model, as follows: [1]
“All other forms of life the earth brought forth,
In diverse species, of her own accord,
When the sun’s radiance warmed the pristine moisture
And slime and ooze marshlands swelled with heat,
And in that pregnant soil the seeds of things,
Nourished as in a mother’s womb, gained life
And grew and gradually assumed a shape.”
Dutch philosopher Benedict Spinoza, noted influence to Goethe, regularly quoted from Ovid, Terence, and other Roman authors. [2]
Ovid's metamorphosis theory, aka assumed a shape theory, supposedly, is one of the back bones to Goethe's morphology theory.
Quotes | On
The following are quotes on Ovid:
“Virgil, in his noble epic, had made its hero the son of a mortal and a goddess, Venus; the implications of this genealogy were a temptation Ovid could not resist.”
— Rolfe Humphries (1954), “Introduction” to Metamorphosis [4]
Quotes | By
The following are related quotes:
“The verses of sublime Lucretius are destined to perish only when a single day will consign the world to destruction.”
— Ovid (16BC), Amores 1.15.23–24 [3]
“We do not desire what we do not know.”
— Ovid (c.10AD), Art of Love (§3.397) [5]
References
1. Ball, Philip. (2011). Unnatural: the Heretical Idea of Making People (pg. 17). Vintage Books.
2. Garrett, Don. (2001). "Introduction", in: Ethics (by: Benedict Spinoza; translator: W.H. White; revised by: A.H. Stirling) (pgs. vii-xv). Wordsworth Editions Limited.
3. Greenblatt, Stephen. (2011). The Swerve: How the Renaissance Began (abs). Random House.
4. Ovid. (8AD). Metamorphosis: Stories of Changing Form (§:Introduction, pgs. v-ix) (translator and introduction: Rolfe Humphries). Indiana University Press, 1955.
5. Meslier, Jean. (1729). Testament: Memoir of the Thoughts and Sentiments of Jean Meslier (translator: Michael Shreve; preface: Michel Onfray) (pg. 423). Prometheus Books.
External links
● Ovid – Wikipedia.
● Metamorphoses – Wikipedia.
