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Unread 02-11-2018, 10:02 AM
Aaron Poochigian Aaron Poochigian is offline
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Andrew,

I feel I hardly need to respond at this point, since I have so thoroughly established that Propertius’ Elegies contain more passion, subtlety and depth than Ovid’s. All the same, though I hesitate to kick a man when he is down, here goes:

As for your first excerpt,

we must agree with what Dr. Papanghelis says, “We should beware of foisting on Propertius the donjuanesque cynicism which Ovid often flaunts in glamorizing urbane adultery.” (Propertius: A Hellenstic Poet on Love and Death, 172)

Far more emotionally resonant is Propertius' assumption of the role of the man cheated on, as when he says to Cynthia:

hos tu iurabas, si quid mentita fuisses,
ut tibi suppositis exciderent manibus:
et contra magnum potes hos attollere Solem,
nec tremis admissae conscia nequitiae?
quis te cogebat multos pallere colores
et fletum invitis ducere luminibus?
quis ego nunc pereo, similis moniturus amantis
‘O nullis tutum credere blanditiis!’

You swore by your eyes, if you’d been false in any way,
they’d vanish away when your fingers touched them.
And can you raise them to the vast sun, and not tremble,
aware of your heinous sins? Who forced your pallor
of shifting complexion, and drew tears from your unwilling eyes?
By those eyes I now am dying, like a man meant to warn other lovers:
‘No charms can ever be safely trusted!’

By those eyes I now am dying!—Come on! That’s great.

As for your second excerpt,

“Sic ego nec sine te nec tecum vivere possum”

“Thus I cannot live with you or without you.”

It is obvious that Ovid PLAGIARIZED that line from U2’s hit song from the 80’s “With Or Without You.”

Your other excerpts are beneath comment.
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Aaron Poochigian

Last edited by Aaron Poochigian; 02-11-2018 at 10:09 AM.
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