Readers looking for an ambitious and thought-provoking winter project are encouraged to join the Woods Hole Public Library’s Classics Reading Group, where they can delve into Ovid’s Metamorphoses over the course of the next three months. The poem, which is made up of 15 books and 11,995 lines, can be a daunting prospect for even the most intrepid readers, so it is especially welcome to read a work of such magnitude together with a group. The first meeting will take place on Saturday, January 27, from 4 – 5:30pm at the Woods Hole Public Library, and will continue on the 4th Saturday of each month.
The Metamorphoses defies easy genre classification. Its use of mythology and inclusion of a wide range of themes from love, to hate, to transformation have inspired writers for generations, including Dante Alighieri, Giovanni Boccaccio, Geoffrey Chaucer, and William Shakespeare.
Leading the group will be Ian Steller, a high school geometry and European history teacher, who also led a discussion group of Aeschylus’ Oresteia at the Woods Hole Public Library this past fall. For reading the Metamorphoses, Ian recommends the Rolfe Humphries translation, but notes that other translations may be read if preferred and that readers should use an edition with line numbers in order to facilitate discussion. Copies of the book are available to check out at the Library.
To participate in the Classics Reading Group, please register by calling the Woods Hole Public Library at 508-548-8961 or emailing whpl_mail@clamsnet.org.