Casual Heroing

I’ll tell you a secret.

There’s this guy called Ovid. Who is he? Well, if that bloody Brit of Shakespeare is to be believed, Ovid is the greatest love poet ever to exist. His most famous work is called The Metamorphosis, and it’s basically a whole lot of tomfoolery of gods chasing girls. My kind of stuff, anyway.

One day, people will stop reading random quotes from the guy and actually read his books. On that day, Ovid will thoroughly disappear from literature. I’m pretty sure that not even College professors – even fewer College students – have actually read anything from the guy.

Why?

First of all, he lived around two thousand years ago, okay?

Well, in Ancient Roman times, they weren’t as liberal as we are now, right? Plus, Ovid was a womanizer. He got ejected from Rome by none other than Augustus himself – not the Elf, but the most powerful Roman Emperor. Why, might you ask? Well, we don’t really know for sure. But the voice is that he fooled around with his daughter.

Let me put that in perspective.

Augustus is the first true Roman Emperor to fill every single position of power in existence and still make the population believe that he was pro-Republic. His era is also defined as the ‘Golden Era’ of the Roman Empire. But what most people don’t know is that he was actually very conservative. There were lots and lots of laws about decorum and whatnot. Basically, lots of censorship.

So, we can say that, in a way, the most powerful Emperor ever was also the most conservative Emperor. Maybe not the most conservative in general, but the most conservative to hold so much power in his hands.

It’s still incredible how some of the greatest works of humankind were produced in that period, like the Aeneid and the Metamorphosis. You might not know this, but, for example, Romeo and Juliet is a rip-off of an Ovidian Myth. Ovid ripped off other authors too, but he was the first to compile a veritable Encyclopedia of Myth in love verses.

Plus, writing is all about ripping each other off all the time. It’s just that the Ancient Romans were incredibly good at it.

Now, the guy was nuts. He was touched in the head.

Why?

Well, even though there were so many laws about decorum, he was fooling around all the time. And when I say, all the time. I mean, all-the-goddamn-time.

I do not agree with the most insane things he spoke of, but I do hold a very high opinion of the guy. If you take him out of context, he’s a madman. Plus, some of the stuff he said is impossible to put into context for anyone without any historical and literary background. Let’s just say the guy was not a saint, ok? It’s easy to judge one of the greatest writers of all time based on a few lines, sure, but he’s still one of, if not the, greatest writers of all time.

So, back to the madman bit.

Under Augustus, he was relegated – ‘exiled’ is a term some historians don’t like – to a backwater city. Why? Historians have quoted that it was because of a ‘carmen’ – a poem – and an ‘error.’ Well, ‘error’ is also a Latin word. Cool, huh?

So, the ‘error’ was supposedly banging Augustus’s daughter.

What a champ.

The ‘carmen,’ the poem, was not the Metamorphosis.

No, sir.

Ovid wrote a book called ‘Ars Amatoria.’ Translated, it means ‘The Art of Love.’

Now, as you might have understood, it’s a book on how to score some good ol’ Roman cabbage, if you catch my drift.

Yeah, the guy wrote what we might call a ‘pick-up-artist’ book two thousand years ago. The most incredible thing? It’s still gold. Most of it, at least. And he wrote it during one of the worst periods, censorship-wise. Think about that. Hilarious.

Let me just take one line I can quote in the original language.

Quae dant quaeque negant, gaudent tamen esse rogatae.

Well, that’s not really the most literal translation, but I’m sure you get the point.

Now, you might be asking yourself, ‘Joey, why are we thinking about this at this exact moment?’

Well, I don’t have a good answer for you, to be honest.

I just found it funny, and it crossed my mind.

Maybe it was the Plato reference? I don’t know.

Honestly, who cares?

I just find it extremely entertaining. It’s not about a punchline or anything, just about how shameless this poet was. The more you think about it and learn about him, the funnier it gets.

“He’s been chuckling for ten minutes straight, now, Flaminia,” Camilla speaks out loud.

“Yeah, he used to go on like that for an hour straight when we were working together. Weird, right?”

“He looks quite dumb doing it,” Camilla rebukes.

“Yeah, he does.”

I turn to the two women with a frown.

“Have you arranged the butter instead of talking smack?”

“Talking what?” Flaminia looks at me, confused.

“Goddamn Elves. Stop munching leaves with your asses or something. Make the butter cold and fairly thin. Let me see what you are doing.”

I explained the part they had to take charge of since I wanted to start cooking the stupid jam. Did you know that the difference between ‘jam’ and ‘jelly’ is just whether the spread has been cleared of fruit residues? Imagine being that picky. ‘Oh no, I don’t want any fruit pieces in my literal fruit-sugared paste.’

God, people.