The Ovidian Sublime. Antiquity and After

Abstract

This article makes the case that the sublime plays a more important part in the poetry of Ovid, and its reception, than is generally acknowledged. It surveys Ovid's use of the word sublimis, from the early amatory to the exilic poetry, and argues that it often connotes sublimity as an aesthetic and ideological category. Within the Metamorphoses particular attention is given to the Phaethon episode (whose sublimity is well recognized) and to the storm in the Ceyx and Alcyone episode (which has less often been considered under the heading of the sublime). Ovid's lost Medea may have anticipated the sublimity of Senecan tragedy. In exile Ovid experiences a failed sublimity in the face of the overwhelming power of the 'storm-god' Augustus.

Keywords

• Ovid
• Lucretius
• Virgil
• Milton
• sublime
• hyperbole