What this project is about.  

This one is from Book 11.

Aesacus and Hesperia, engraving by Johann Ulrich Krauss for a 1690 edition of Ovid’s Metamorphoses Book XI, 771–776. 

How long it took to read this (aloud): 3 mins 28s

What it’s “about”: More goddam rape. This time the rapist takes responsibility for his crime (though his target got bitten by a snake while fleeing him) tries to kill himself by jumping off a high cliff. A meddling god gives him feathers, and he ends up as a diver. 

Words I didn’t know: none

Quotable quotes: 

He took a fancy to Hespena, 

The youthful daughter of the River Cebran, 

Who as she sat close to her father’s river, 

Bleached her long hair beneath a noonday sun. 

The boy surprised her and the girl ran from him, 

As if he were a wolf and she a doe, 

Or as a wild duck tries to escape a hawk. 

The girl gained speed, he flew on wings of love, 

While she, poor child, seemed to grow wings of terror. 

But look! A snake came sliding through the grasses, 

Snapped at her foot, and as she fell to earth, 

His poison filled her veins, and flight was done.

AND

Your life was more to me than joy to take you. 

The snake and I are brother murderers, 

And I the cause of death far more than he — 

And death shall be my comfort after all!” 

With this, he tossed himself from a high cliff. 

Tethys, who saw him fall, felt pity for him, 

And as he fell, she covered him with feathers, 

Then, floating seaward, he sailed free of Death

Yet this was not the freedom he desired. 

Up, up he clambered, flapping awkward wings, 

Then threw himself to sea for Death to take him. 

Such frenzied self-abasement made him slender, 

His legs, his neck grew long — and the sea claimed him, 

Kept him a curious bird and half a sailor; 

They named him Margus, proper for a diver.

How it lands to my eco-sensibility: xx

Obvious allusions, ways it was used (that I am aware of already) : xx

What I know I didn’t ‘get’: xx

To my knowledge, who’s used it why/how (RACC): xx

Further research questions: xx

Anything else: xx