Department of English

The influence of the Roman poet Ovid on subsequent art and literature was considerable. Designed with students of art and literature in mind, this course surveys the Ovidian tradition from antiquity to the present. We will consider: Ovid himself, Apuleius, medieval "moralizers" of Ovid's tales, many writers of the English Renaissance (especially Spenser, Shakespeare, and Milton), Italian Renaissance poets, composers, and painters, book illustrators from the sixteenth century through Picasso, French film maker Jean Cocteau, and contemporary playwright Mary Zimmerman. The course offers students a chance to survey the extent of the "classical tradition" and to contemplate Ovid through the eyes of centuries of readers.