Amores 2.1: A Poetic Analysis

Within artistic circles, there is a constant tension between “valuable” and, for lack of a better word, “trashy” art. This bifurcation is pervasive, seeping into cultural discourse whenever an artist’s work finds virality amid the brain-rot-infused algorithms that seemingly only push pretty dancing and “hot takes.” Therefore, when an artist does break through, one would assume that fellow artists would band together on social media to celebrate their success. Unfortunately, the opposite happens. Comments sections are filled with vile ad hominem attacks and arguments that the artist is not “real.” They’re not arguing that the person doesn’t have skin, bones, and a beating heart; they’re arguing that this person doesn’t deserve the title of artist. Whether it’s due to a lack of overt complexity in their work, the medium they used, or even the subject matter, something about this artist and their creation has been deemed trashy and fittingly deplored. I am not commenting on a new phenomenon, but an entrenched and problematic one that has only increased in popularity over the past few years. 

Who decides “valuable” versus “trashy” art? How much pedigree must you hold to make that value judgement? Should everyone be able to? Should no one at all? A common argument is that all art is subjective and that value is inherently a personal judgement, so no sweeping claims about art can be made. But that argument feels incomplete. To prove that something considered “trashy” truly is not, I feel there must be an impact it has that is often overlooked yet crucial (for example, the community-building fan art or the soothing, simple xylophone piece). Ovid certainly agrees. Much like romance novels are rendered trashy today, love elegies in Ancient Rome were approached with very much the same lens – not much has really changed. So, let us read Ovid’s passionate defense of love poetry in Amores 2.1; we might just find out how best (or worst) to evaluate and defend art today. 

The Poem itself 

*English translation by A.S. Kline, chief translator of Poetry in Translation 

Original Latin 

Hoc quoque conposui Paelignis natus aquosis,

ille ego nequitiae Naso poeta meae.

hoc quoque iussit Amor—procul hinc, procul este, severae!

non estis teneris apta theatra modis.

me legat in sponsi facie non frigida virgo,

et rudis ignoto tactus amore puer;

atque aliquis iuvenum quo nunc ego saucius arcu

agnoscat flammae conscia signa suae,

miratusque diu 'quo' dicat 'ab indice doctus

conposuit casus iste poeta meos?'

Ausus eram, memini, caelestia dicere bella

centimanumque Gyen—et satis oris erat—

cum male se Tellus ulta est, ingestaque Olympo

ardua devexum Pelion Ossa tulit.

in manibus nimbos et cum Iove fulmen habebam,

quod bene pro caelo mitteret ille suo—

Clausit amica fores! ego cum Iove fulmen omisi;

excidit ingenio Iuppiter ipse meo.

Iuppiter, ignoscas! nil me tua tela iuvabant;

clausa tuo maius ianua fulmen habet.

blanditias elegosque levis, mea tela, resumpsi;

mollierunt duras lenia verba fores.

carmina sanguineae deducunt cornua lunae,

et revocant niveos solis euntis equos;

carmine dissiliunt abruptis faucibus angues,

inque suos fontes versa recurrit aqua.

carminibus cessere fores, insertaque posti,

quamvis robur erat, carmine victa sera est.

Quid mihi profuerit velox cantatus Achilles?

quid pro me Atrides alter et alter agent,

quique tot errando, quot bello, perdidit annos,

raptus et Haemoniis flebilis Hector equis?

at facie tenerae laudata saepe puellae,

ad vatem, pretium carminis, ipsa venit.

magna datur merces! heroum clara valete

nomina; non apta est gratia vestra mihi!

ad mea formosos vultus adhibete, puellae,

carmina, purpureus quae mihi dictat Amor!

English Translation

I, that poet Naso, born by Pelignian waters,

also composed these, my naughtinesses.

Here too Love commands – go far, stay far, you puritans!

You’re not fit audience for the erotic mode.

Let the virgin who’s not frigid, who’s betrothed, read me,

and the inexperienced boy unused to the touch of love:

and let some other youth, now I’m wounded by the bow,

acknowledge the shared sign of his passion,

and gazing long at it say: ‘what betrayal has he learnt,

this poet, that he’s written about my misfortunes?’

I remember, I dared to speak about celestial war

and hundred-handed Gyas – that was enough effrontery –

with Earth herself’s fell vengeance, and Ossa

and steep Pelion piled on high Olympus.

And I had Jupiter, with thunder and lightning, in hand,

the things he throws with such effect through the sky –

my lover closed the door! I dropped Jove and the lightning:

my genius let fall Jupiter himself.

Jupiter, forgive me! Your weapons were no help:

her entrance was even closed to your mightier bolt.

I resumed my weapons, light flattering elegies:

gentle words can soften harsh doors.

Songs can draw down the blood-red moon,

and call the sun’s white stallions from their journey:

Serpents’ jaws are forced apart by song,

and fountains flow backwards to their source.

Doors yield to song, and the bolt rammed home,

however hard it is, is conquered at last by charms.

What does it profit me to sing of swift Achilles?

what use to me one or the other Atrides,

whoever that was who wasted years on war and wandering,

or sad Hector dragged behind the Thessalian horses.

but her face often praised, the beautiful girl herself

comes for the poet, the reward for song.

A great prize won! Bright heroic names farewell:

your rewards are not adequate for me!

Songs bring the beautiful girls to my shining face,

songs that Love dictates to me!

Part I: Theme & Voice 

At its core, Amores 2.1 is a passionate defense of elegiac poetry, even going so far as to posit its superiority. Rather than arguing on a societal scale, Ovid opts for a personal and functional one – he takes on the voice of an artist who is confident in his superior choice to write poems revolving around love. Dramatizing this choice, Ovid frames himself as midway through a Roman epic, the revered, heroic style of poetry the Roman public yearned for, when the power of love overtook him. His hand, he argues, was forced, and the poem we are reading now is merely him fulfilling the destiny love preordained for him. Indeed, to Ovid, the real-world power of love is far greater than any mythological conquest immortalized in poetry. The grand nature of a poem’s content does not define its value. Instead, by disseminating the narratives of love, Ovid believes he is engaging in the most valuable pursuit of all. 

Ovid’s voice is central to the poem's power. Witty, self-referential, and directly addressing his readers, Ovid creates an intimate, personal theater for his exploration of love, a public itch to be part of. The club is exclusive: only an audience who reveres love is welcome to see their experiences mirrored in his poetry. To this select audience, Ovid spills secrets far more potent than the tired narratives of the epic. He reinforces his perception of the epic as self-congratulatory and superfluous with a mock-grandiose tone as the poem opens, yet then shifts into the raw, emotional, and confident tone of a successful love poet. He has found the prize that an epic could never give him, and that achievement grants him superiority over the herd of subpar epic writers. 

Part II: Meter

One of the significant differences, besides content, of an epic and an elegy is the meter. While the epic tends to consist solely of lines of dactylic hexameter, the elegy contains one meter of dactylic hexameter followed by a line of pentameter. Therefore, the elegiac couplet becomes a personification of Ovid’s argument that the elegy possesses more depth than the epic. The lines of hexameter can still carry the emotional weight and gravitas of an epic, rendering the love poem just as capable of powerful emotional highs. However, the pentameter line grounds the love elegy in a way the epic never gets the luxury of being. Undercutting the grandeur, the line's conciseness creates a sense of closure and reflection, allowing the poem to be deeply personal to each reader. 

This dynamic is perfectly illustrated at the poem's turning point. In the line of hexameter, "Clausit amica fores! ego cum Iove fulmen omisi,” translated as “my lover closed the door! I dropped Jove and the lightning,” a romantic theme able to take up the mantle of epic tradition. Within the content of the poem, his love closing the door leads him to shift from writing an epic to a love elegy– love possesses the ultimate power. Therefore, it displaces mythological themes in the longer hexameter line. Similarly, in the following line of pentameter, “excidit ingenio Iuppiter ipse meo,” translated as “my genius let fall Jupiter himself,” great mythological themes are humiliated by love in love’s own arena. Ovid’s love triumphs over Jupiter, precipitating him dropping the all-powerful King of the Gods himself, cementing love as just as, if not more powerful than myth. 

Part III: Rhetoric 

Setting and Subverting the Scene: Recusatio and Irony

All of Amores 2.1 is structured around an elaborate recusatio that subverts typical traditions. A standard recusatio, or opening to an epic poem, consists of a poet claiming with utmost humility that he could not possibly do justice to the great themes of an epic. However, Ovid does not adopt a humble, honored tone. Instead, the poem’s opening is a command from love itself: “hoc quoque iussit Amor—procul hinc, procul este, severae!” In this line, translated idiomatically as “Here too Love commands – go far, stay far, you puritans!”, Ovid refuses to entertain the themes of the epic and instead argues that a divine and all-powerful force, love, is forcing him to write an elegy. Here, he displays irony on two levels. First, he inverts the typical introduction of a poet, not once stating that he is unworthy. As such, he claims superiority over his counterparts, and by extension, the superiority of the elegy over the epic. Second, he inverts the expected content of his poem. He portrays love and its power as the hyperbolic power of the epic, and even goes as far as claiming that he wields Jupiter’s thunderbolt. Bathetic and undeserved, the power of the epic is rendered obsolete: the only power that remains is the power of love. 

Reinforcing the Dichotomy: Imagery & Antithesis

Ovid weaponizes two contrasting sets of imagery throughout the poem to illustrate the profound difference between epic and elegy. While the epic imagery is marked by violence and chaos, with references to celestial warfare, monsters, and brutish physical force, the imagery associated with the elegy has a magical, transcendent quality. He writes, “carmina sanguineae deducunt cornua lunae/et revocant niveos solis euntis equos,” translated as “songs can draw down the blood-red moon/and call the sun’s white stallions from their journey.” The otherworldly and divine qualities are here not associated with the gods, but with the act of loving itself. The lover and the love poet, by extension, possess this very power, asserting their dominance over those partial to the epic. 

Part IV: Audience Reception

A contemporary Roman audience would have easily recognized Amores 2.1 as a provocative and subversive masterpiece. Although love poetry was common within Roman poetic spheres, the most esteemed works were always the epics. Underneath Augustus, Rome’s culture promoted values of piety, morality, and reverence for the state, themes more often embodied in the epic genre, which generated countless works centering on the divine origins of Rome itself. For Ovid to flippantly drop Jupiter in favor of the themes of love would have stunned his Roman audience. In addition, by referencing beautiful young girls throughout his poem, Ovid directly challenges Augustus’s moral legislation, which aimed to regulate marriage and promote public morality. Thus, a Roman audience would have viewed Amores 2.1 as more than just a love elegy, but a witty and countercultural embrace of love over myth. 

In conclusion…

Ovid did not allow his work to be viewed as subpar just because it entertained a less esteemed subject matter. Instead, he wrote a masterful and famous elegy as to why his work deserves to be valued even more than its more popular counterpart. The elegy, through its personal and persuasive subject matter, does what the epic cannot; it touches the human heart. Therefore, if any piece of work you create touches the heart of anyone – makes them feel something they would not have otherwise – it holds value. Don’t let the internet trolls get you down, but don’t just believe me either. Take one of the most famous Roman poets’ words instead. 

We hope you enjoyed this poetic analysis of Ovid's Amores 2.1. Please leave any comments, questions, or concerns below, and be sure to recommend future prose or poems for us to dive into!