Introduction

This is the first intermediate-student edition of a selection from Ovid's Amores. Poems 2.2, 2.4, 2.6, 2.10, 2.12 are included as Latin text with an accompanying commentary and vocabulary. Focusing on a deliberately limited number of poems, this edition is designed to be manageable for students reading the text for the first time while also perfectly encapsulating the interest of Ovid's other work and inspiring further study of it. A detailed introduction explains points of historical and stylistic interest, including analysis of a further six poems: 2.1, 2.9 (both parts), 2.11, 2.15, 2.17, 2.18.

Ovid's Amores represent the culmination of Roman love elegy, and the selection from Book II presented here shows the poet at the height of his literary and sexual powers. From dead parrots and eunuch slaves to the elusive mistress Corinna, Ovid teases and tantalises, deftly reworking themes and motifs from his elegiac predecessors to produce verse of effortless sophistication, wit and charm, poems that for the last two thousand years have scandalised and delighted readers in equal measure.