Heroides (Heroines)

'They say your ship has docked in Thessaly and you're enriched with the golden fleece. Let me congratulate you on your safe return, but I'd rather have learned of it from a letter.' Ovid's Heroides (Heroines) is a unique collection of fictional letters, written by an outstanding poet of the Augustan age. Self-portraits, in effect, of women exposed to extreme stress through their relationships to beloved men, these letters bring characters familiar from classical mythology to life, affording intimate glimpses into the ways of thought and feeling of a culture that is distant, and yet easily accessible to readers today. Penelope writes to Ulysses of her failing efforts to keep their household together in his absence; Dido to Aeneas of her despair at his imminent departure; Medea to Jason of her desperation at his abandonment of her for another woman; Paris writes enthusiastically to Helen, and receives an ambiguous and diplomatic reply. Reason and emotion, from the most delicate nuance of ambivalent feeling to the most intense heat of passion, are put on display, leavened by an occasional note of humour. Sarah Kafatou's new translations of Ovid's poems are accompanied by an…

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