In light of the socio-political contours of the 21st century, Ovid’s magnum opus, the Metamorphoses, a collection of etiological and theophanic stories, evinces the power imbalances between men and women that undergirded the Roman world. In many myths, Ovid displays a “male gaze” and consistently reiterates a narrative of the male subjugation of a female victim. Often, he only brings a woman’s voice to life for the purpose of responding to a male character or of speaking in self-defense against the threat of sexual violence. While Ovid’s work does feature a gradient within the spectrum of “love” stories[1], his narratives that depict sexual violence should be recognized as instances of assault and not so gratuitously idealized that they appear only as variations on the theme of love. However, although many stories lead to disturbing moments of sexual violence, both potential and realized, they are no more egregious than many other works of literature that feature the brutality that men can perpetrate against women, or other similarly difficult situations. Moreover, though there is a male bias throughout a large part of Ovid’s collection of myths, his work does not necessarily lead to the validation of reprehensible male behavior. Accordingly, reading Ovid today does not necessarily cause harm; rather, by analyzing and contextualizing the stories, modern readers can isolate improper and offensive masculinity and amplify the position of women who for so long have been victims within literature and society.
Ovid frames the story of Apollo and Daphne within the context of theomachy as Cupid and Apollo are featured arguing over the extent of their masculinity. Each god boasts to the other that they are the more powerful god, asserting that the arrows they carry, which are inherently phallic motifs, are more potent than the other’s. “Delius hunc nuper… superbus” (“The Delian one, arrogant”, 454), having recently laid low a Python with countless arrows begins to insult Cupid by questioning his choice of arms, stirring “saeva Cupidinis ira” (“The cruel anger of Cupid”, 453). Cupid in response inveighs against Phoebus “figat tuus omnia… gloria nostra” (“even though your bow pierces all things, my bow [pierces] you; and by as much as all the animals yield to the god, by just so much is your glory less than ours”, 463-465). In Cupid’s rhetoric, his use of the poetic plural “nostra” (465) is undeniably an act of nosism that displays his machismo. Thus, Ovid’s world becomes predicated by a power struggle between two male characters, with an impossible potentiality for a balanced or harmonious world of equality. Women, whether mortal or divine, do not share in this contest, though there is perhaps an interpretation that directs the reader to view men as foolishly bellicose and frivolous in trying to outdo each other for the sake of their own egos. Ovid’s frame presents a man’s world, with two gods vying for power.
The story of Apollo and Daphne establishes a pattern of male and female love and desire that may seem misplaced, uncomfortable, and inappropriate to a 21st century reader. Daphne, like so many other women in the Metamorphoses, is an object of desire–pursued, but not the pursuer. The polysyndeton in the “laudat digitosque manusque / bracchiaque et nudos media plus parte lacertos / si qua latent, meliora putat” (“he praises her fingers and her hands and her arms / and her upper-arms, more than half naked/unadorned, / if there are any other body parts that lie hidden, he thinks/imagines those things better”, 499-501) can be construed as excessively encomiastic and objectifying as her physical qualities become items in a list of attributes, especially focused on those that are “nudos.” Phoebus effectively fails to see anything beyond Daphne’s surface appearance. In fact, it is those aspects of her that “latent,” (“lie hidden”, 501), a clear reference to her pudenda, that are given the high regard of being “meliora,” (“better”) to the god. Ultimately, Phoebus does not extol or even mention Daphne’s character or seem to have knowledge of who she is as a person. In fact, the men in the story seem to be so wholly engrossed in reverence for her “forma,” (“beauty”, 489) that they believe it to “voto … repugnant,” (“resist her oath”, 489). Daphne is seemingly unable to escape herself. Daphne's beauty is the cause of the assault because of Apollo's obsessive male gaze, and she is unable to escape her own beauty. The dramatic context of the poem describes Daphne as a maiden of Diana and as such bound by a vow of chastity. Ultimately, Phoebus is so consumed by his passion for Daphne (caused by Cupid’s arrow) that he is willing and even eager to cause her to disregard her divine oath.
Perhaps the most uncomfortable element of the pursuit is the extreme misalliance between a male god and a female mortal. Phoebus is obsessively and single-mindedly in “love” and filled with sexual lust, and she only wants to escape from him. Phoebus is “sic pectore toto / uritur et sterilem sperando nutrit amorem” (“in his whole heart he is burned and he feeds futile love by hoping”, 495-496). Phoebus seemingly does not recognize the futility of his chase and is unrelenting in his pursuit of Daphne. There is no meeting of the minds or balance or compromise. It is not a mutual love, and, in fact, their feelings move in opposite directions. Moreover, Daphne is described as being in a state of extreme distress, needing to take extraordinary measures to fend off the pursuit by a more powerful god. She takes off with “timido…cursu” (“fearful flight”, 525) and “fugit, cumque ipso verba inperfecta” (“she fled him about to say more and she left the unfinished words with him himself”, 526). Daphne is desperate to flee Phoebus’s libidinal fervor and her fearful flight speaks to her despair. Phoebus’ frustration in his pursuit of Daphne is similarly apparent. In a florid simile, Ovid describes the god’s chase of Daphne as analogous to when “canis in vacuo leporem cum Gallicus arvo / vidit, et … pedibus petit …alter in ambiguo est, an sit conprensus, et ipsis / morsibus eripitur tangentiaque ora relinquit” (“a gallic dog sees a hare in an empty field and…attacks the prey…[as] that one (seeks) salvation… [the] one about to cling to hopes to hold now and now and grazes the footprints with his snout”, 533-538). In this simile, the syntax of “iam iamque” (“now and now”, 535), affords a rapidity to the active chase and dimension of urgency as Phoebus struggles to even grasp at Daphne’s footprints. Ovid’s choice of syntax and the phrase’s scansion illuminates Daphne’s distress at being chased by the relentless Phoebus.
Daphne calls out to her father for help, giving voice to her desire to remain a virgin and not be forced into a relationship she does not want. She flees to her father “inque patris blandis haerens cervice lacertis, / ‘Da mihi perpetua, genitor carissime dixit’” (“and clinging with charming arms on her father’s neck she said, ‘O dearest father, give to me that I might enjoy perpetual maidenhood!’”, 485-486). Phoebus’s love would have her break her oath, which contravenes the divine laws she swore to obey. Her father’s only recourse is to deprive her of human form in order to save her and she transforms from the corporeal to the arboreal. Ultimately, Daphne is not given an outcome that allows her to preserve her identity. Whatever autonomy or agency she might have had is effectively destroyed in this metamorphosis and concomitant metagenesis. Even in the aftermath of her transformation, Phoebus seems unable to let go of his lust and maintains cathected to a now indurated Daphne promulgating: “quoniam coniūnx mea nōn potes esse, / arbor eris certē” (“since you are not able to be my bride, at least you will certainly be my tree”, 557-558). Although Daphne is successful in saving herself from the fate that Apollo had planned for her, which bears the potential threat of rape, she ends up as a laurel tree and loses her human form, an interesting outcoming etiologically, but not a very positive one for her. Ultimately, Phoebus, as a god, oversteps. His male desire and entitlement prove excessive and injurious.
Ovid’s account of the myth of Pygmalion and Galatea[2] follows many of the same literary tropes as Apollo and Daphne. In the frame of the story, Pygmalion, a master sculptor, is described as an openly perfervid misogynist. After witnessing prostitution among the “obscenae…Propoetides” (“foul Cyprian girls”, 238), who were “aevum per crimen agentes” (“living a life through crime”, 243), he bears a distaste for all women, as if they all behave like prostitutes. Thus, he “sine coniuge caelebs / vivebat thalamique diu consorte carebat” (“he was living unmarried and was lacking for a long time a partner of his bedchamber”, 245-246). Though Pygmalionm hates women, he seemingly is in need of a female companion. To rectify this problem, the sculptor decides to sculpt a woman of “ebur formam … / operisque sui concepit amorem” (“snow-white ivory and he gave it shape…/ and he conceived a love of his own work”, 248- 249), borne out of his own needs and desires. Pygmalion successfully fashions a woman of ivory, the whiteness of which bears connotations of purity in contrast to the prostitutes, and who remains unnamed throughout the myth, effectively possessing no agency beyond what he affords her. To Pygmalion, an independent woman is anathema, and the Galatea he fashions is the apotheosis of a submissive woman, voiceless and passive. The metamorphosis and simultaneous metagenesis that Galatea experiences functions as the complete inverse of Daphne’s story and resulting metamorphosis. Daphne transforms from human to tree; Galatea transforms from ivory into human form. While there seems to be some sort of discontinuity between their narratives, both myths are predicated upon the male domination of a woman’s corporeal form.
While Ovid does feature some difficult issues in his Metamorphoses, his myths provide an insightful look into the past and can be used as a springboard for progress in the tomorrow of today’s 21st century. To simply ignore the history of ancient myth and elide a literature that at times can seem extremely disturbing, would be to promote a specious narrative of Latin literature and Roman (and Greek) culture. As Leo Curran adroitly asserts “the Metamorphoses is not a treatise on rape…” we should not think of this literature as an apparatus of sublimating the act of sexual assault, and “…systematically ignoring this fact [of the prevalence of rape in Ovid] and refusing to take rape seriously, glosses over unpleasant reality and prefers euphemism to the word rape” (214). Ultimately, it is possible to read the Metamorphoses without causing harm, but it is crucial that in reading these myths we bring attention to the issue of rape, because it is not permissible behavior and is always harmful.
[1] The myth of Baucis and Philemon is a comely depiction of love and respect that realizes a paradigmatic and rather intense display of gender equality in an amorous narrative.
[2] Only in the 18th century, when Jean-Jacques Rousseau wrote a play about the myth of Pygmalion, did the name Galatea, meaning pale-skinned, begin to be associated with the sculpture.
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