Authors: Ovid
Tags: #Literature & Fiction, #History & Criticism, #Criticism & Theory, #Movements & Periods, #Poetry, #Ancient; Classical & Medieval
The Art of Love (6 page)
Don’t be shy of making promises; women are fair game
For promise-makers; invoke any god you care to name
To witness your oath. Jupiter from above
Smiles on the perjuries of men in love
And bids the Aeolian winds shred them in air.
He himself would often swear
To Juno with a hollow
“By the Styx!,” and now he favours all who follow
His bad example. That gods should exist
Is expedient; let us therefore not resist
Belief in them; let incense and wine be given
On their ancient hearths, for the ones in heaven
Don’t loll about in a sort of half-sleep,
They’re everywhere; so live virtuously, keep
Safe and return loans; honour your bond, eschew
Fraud, and have nothing to do
With bloodshed. A wise man will cheat
No one but women—it’s not a risky feat,
And only here there’s a kind of duty in deceit.
Deceive the deceivers! Since for the most part
They fib, let them fall, snared by their own art!
Egypt, they say, once had a drought, her ears
Of corn unrained-on for nine years,
When Thrasius approached the king and demonstrated
That the gods could be propitiated
By a stranger’s blood. “Then you’re the first
Victim,” Busiris said. “Cure Egypt’s thirst!”
And I could mention
Perillus roasted in his own invention,
The cruel bronze bull, by Phalaris—the biter bit.
Both kings were right, for it’s good law, and fit,
For a death-contriver to die by his own art.
So let liars fool liars, and Woman smart
From wounds in a war she was the one to start!
Tears, too, can be helpful—they can move adamant.
If you can, show her cheeks wet with tears; if you can’t
(They don’t always come on cue),
Dab your eyes with water, stage-manage the “dew.”
Mix—who doesn’t who’s wise?—
Kisses with your sweet talk, and if she tries
To deny them, simply take what she denies.
She may struggle at first and call you a sinner,
But she doesn’t really want to be the winner.
Only take care not to cause her soft lips pain
With your raids—she mustn’t be able to complain
That you’re so rough you bruise.
Men deserve to lose
The points they’ve won already if they snatch
The foreplay kisses and fail to clinch the match.
After all the kissing, how far away
Were you from …? Ah, you were clumsy rather than shy, I’d say.
Some force is permissible—women are often pleased
By force, and like what they’re giving to be seized.
The girl whose citadel is stormed
By sheer audacity feels warmed,
Complimented; the one who could have been attacked
And taken by force but escapes intact,
Although she affects to look glad,
Feels let down, a little sad.
Phoebe was raped by her lover, Hilaira by hers,
Yet both ravished sisters loved their ravishers.
And there’s the old tale—but it’s worth while
Retelling it—of Achilles and the girl from the isle
Of Scyros. It was years after Aphrodite,
In return for Paris’s award for beauty
When she triumphed on Ida over her two peers,
Gave him
his
fatal prize; it was years
After Priam welcomed his foreign relative,
And a Greek wife came to live
Inside Troy’s walls, and every chief
Swore allegiance to the wronged husband, and the grief
Of one man became
A people’s cause. It was while (deep shame,
Had his mother’s prayers not put him under stress)
Achilles hid his manhood in a woman’s dress.
What are you doing? Spinning’s not your concern,
Grandson of Aeacus: you must earn
Fame through another art of Pallas. Why do you stand
With a basket on your shield arm, quite unmanned?
Why do you hold in your right hand—
The one by which great Hector will be slain—
A soft wool-skein?
Throw away that spindle with its troublesome thread,
Pick up your spear instead!
Deidamia, who shared his bedroom, found
He was indeed a man, indeed she was “raped” (one’s bound
To accept tradition, of course),
But, still, she wanted to be taken by force.
“Stay,” she begged him again and again, “please stay,”
When Achilles was already on his way,
His distaff dumped, a warrior under arms.
But now I ask, “What harm’s
Been done by force, Princess?
Why do you wheedle and press
The author of your rape to linger?”
Agreed, shame points a finger
At girls who make the first move, but agreed
Also, it’s nice to follow a strong lead.
It’s a vain, over-confident man who expects
The woman to make the running. Our sex
Should take the initiative, propose,
Plead, coax with words—she’ll listen kindly to those.
She’ll be yours if you ask; to be asked is all she requires;
Just give her a start, and a good excuse to grant your desires.
When Jupiter wooed a heroine,
he
went to
her
As a suppliant—no girl seduced great Jupiter.
But if you find your pleas only produce disdain,
Stop, take a step back, think again.
Many women desire what eludes them and hate to be pressed;
Play it coolly, hold their interest.
Don’t ask as if you were sure of getting it in the end:
Let the lover slip through, masked, in the name of friend.
I’ve seen the hardest case fooled by this ploy—
“Best friend” in no time became “darling boy.”
A pale skin doesn’t suit a sailor—a man
Exposed to sun and brine should have a tan;
So should a farmer who with heavy harrow and share
Turns the soil all day in the open air,
And for you athletes going for the olive-wreath a white
Body would be inapposite.
All lovers should be pallid, it’s chic to be pale;
Only fools deny it, pale skins rarely fail.
Pale was Orion when he roamed the woods and pined
For Side, pale was Daphnis when his naiad proved unkind.
Look lean—it suggests passion; don’t blush to wear
A neat cap on top of your well-washed hair.
Night after sleepless night,
Loss of appetite,
Worry, love-sickness, they all make
The young lover as thin as a rake.
For your purpose, look so pitiful that you move
The world to exclaim, “He’s in love!”
Now shall I complain, or just tell you,
That nowadays right and wrong are blurred? The value
Of friendship’s nil, “good faith” is a mere phrase.
I’m sorry to say that it’s not safe to praise
Your girl in front of a friend—if he trusts what you’ve said,
He’ll usurp your place in bed.
“But,” you may protest,
“Patroclus never fouled Achilles’ nest,
Phaedra was safe with Pirithous, Hermione
Was loved by Pylades honourably,
As was Pallas by Phoebus and Helen by Castor, their brothers,
And I could cite others.”
Believe what you please.
Swallow that and you’ll look for apples on tamarisk trees
And honeycombs in rivers. Now only the base
Appeals. Each man’s on his own pleasure chase,
And the pleasure’s double
If his enjoyment means another’s trouble.
It’s a crime that it’s not their enemies
Lovers have most to fear. The safest motto is:
Shun those you trust
. Cousins, brothers, peers—
They are the ones who’ll justify your fears.
I was about to end, but so various are women’s hearts
That to catch a thousand takes a thousand arts.
You don’t raise corn
and
fruit
In the same field; one soil will suit
Olives, another vines, and in other places
Wheat thrives. Hearts have as many traits as faces.
The wise man adapts himself to every style;
He’s as versatile
As Proteus, he can turn into a wave of the sea,
A bristling boar, a lion, or a tree.
Depending on the fish, angle, cast nets or trawl,
And don’t employ the same technique for all
Age-groups—a veteran hind
A good way off smells something in the wind.
If a dunce finds you far too clever or a prude
Thinks you’re gross and crude,
Next day she’ll be sorry, tortured by self-doubt.
That’s how it comes about
That girls who shy away from decent lads
Fall cheap into the arms of cads.
This part of my task is finished, more remains.
Let my boat rest here, I’ll drop the anchor-chains.
*
A quotation from Virgil’s
Aeneid
, vi, 129—
“Hoc opus, hic labor est.”
OOK
T
WO
Shout “Hurrah!,” a triumphant hurrah, for my traps have caught
The quarry I sought.
Each happy lover awards my poem the palm, first prize;
I outshine Homer and Hesiod in his eyes.
He’s as pleased as Pelops, the unknown face
Who won both the chariot-race
And Hippodameia, as pleased as Paris, the stranger
Who snatched his bride from the heart of Sparta’s danger
And spread his white sails for Troy.
But why the hurry, boy?
Your ship’s still out at sea,
And the port I’m aiming for distant. Thanks to me
You’ve a mistress, but that’s just a start. I’m teaching a beginner
How to keep as well as how to win her.
Hunting’s hard work, but so is guarding the kill;
There’s some luck in the chase, but this takes real skill.
I appeal to you, Venus and Cupid, and to you,
Erato, the Muse whose name connotes love too—
Be my friends now, if ever,
And help me in this, my epic endeavour,
To describe ways and means of keeping Love at home,
The world-ranging gypsy who must roam,
Being fickle and equipped
With wings for flight not easily tied or clipped.
[L
ATIN
:
Hospitis effugio praestruxerat…
]
Minos confined Daedalus, all exits blocked,
Yet his guest found a bold way out. Having locked
The Minotaur up, spawn of his mother’s guilt,
Half-man, half-bull, having built
The labyrinth, “Just king,” he pleaded, “send
Me home now, let my exile end
And Attica have my ashes. Since I was banned
By unkind fate from my own land,
Allow me to die there. If you hold the services I’ve done
Cheap, then at least grant a return to my son.
Or, if you won’t spare him, spare me.” He pleaded,
And might have said much more, none of it heeded:
Minos refused. Seeing the king’s will
Was fixed, Daedalus thought, “I’ll use my skill,
Here’s my chance. Land and sea are controlled
And barred by him; one route’s left—the air. Be bold,
Try it. Jupiter, pardon my enterprise!
I don’t aspire to your starry house in the skies,
But the tyrant has me in a fix,
And this is the one way out. We’d swim the Styx
If it offered a passage! Now I must invent
New laws for human nature, test an element.”
A crisis stirs invention. Who would believe
That a man could ever cleave
A path through air? But he ranged feathered wings,
Like birds’, on a light frame with linen fastenings,
And glued the base with melted wax. It was complete—
A novel machine, a craftsman’s feat!
Smiling, the boy fingered wings and wax,
Not knowing the harness was for their own backs
Till his father spoke: “These are the craft I’ve made
To sail home by, with their aid
We must fly from Minos. He may have shut
All other escape routes, but
The air’s not his—break through it
With my invention—you can do it!
But take great care:
Don’t gaze at the stars, don’t go by the Bear
Or the swordsman Orion; track
me
with the wings provided;
I’ll lead, you follow; you’re safe, only be guided,
For the wax won’t stand the heat if we go
Too high, close to the sun, and if we drop too low
Our beating wings will get sodden with spray.
Steer in between. And, my son, stay
Alert to the winds—when the breeze is behind,
Sail with it.” While he’s telling him what to mind,
He fits the gear on the boy, explains the technique—
Like any mother bird instructing her weak
Fledglings—and straps on the wings he’s made
For his own shoulders, anxiously poised for this raid
On the unknown. On the verge of flight, while the tears run
Unchecked down his cheeks, he kisses his small son.
Not from a mountain, but a modest height
Above the plain, the pair launched on their tragic flight.
Daedalus worked his wings, glanced back at his son’s, held the steady
Course he’d planned. Already
The wonder of it thrilled them. Fear gone, Icarus flew
With growing skill and daring. (The airborne two
Froze a lone angler in mid-action,
Who dropped his quivering rod in stupefaction.)
Naxos, Paros, Delos—Apollo’s favourite isle—
Slid by. To the north, meanwhile,
Lay Samos, southward Lebynthos, the thick, shady trees
Of Calymne, and the rich fisheries
Of Astypalaea. Now it was that the boy,
Childishly reckless in the careless joy
Of flying, left his sire
And soared higher and higher,
Dangerously close to the sun-god’s fire.
The wax was melting, the fastenings gave, his arms flailed
To get a grip on the thin air, and failed.
Terrified, he looked down from the skies
At the waves, and panic blackness filled his eyes.
The wax all melted, his arms, now bare,
Thrashed in the unsupporting air,
With a shudder he plunged, and as he went called out,
“Father, Father, I’m falling!” till his shout
Was choked by the grey-green sea. Aghast,
His father, now a father in the past,
Was crying, “Icarus, where are you?,” crying,
“Icarus, whereabouts in the sky are you flying?”
Then he saw the floating plumes.
Earth has his bones; his name the sea assumes.
