Waaaaaait for it.....

Currently in Earphones: "The Curlew / Sean Og's / The Sligo Maid" by Ciunas

Errrr, sorry. Still don't quite have the time to write up a full post about the Photo Rally. In short, all the work that I eschewed in favor of the photo rally is now threatening to drag me out the front door and beat me senseless in the streets. This might take a while.

In the meantime, here's a passage (in translation) from a little something I've been reading. There are probably more than a few ladies who can associate with this...

"He indeed is ungrateful, and regardless of all my good offices; and I am a fond fool, not to tear him instantly from my heart. In spite of all his ill-usage, I have not power to hate him. I can only complain of his baseness; and, when my complaints are over, love him more than ever. Pity, O Venus, your daughter-in-law; pierce, O Cupid, the unrelenting heart of your brother, and teach him to fight under your banners. Teach me also, who have already begun the pleasing task, (for I deny it not,) and let him prove an object worthy of my tenderness and concern. I rave; and the enchanting image deludes my eager mind; nor does he retain any portion of the softness of his mother. You are certainly the offspring of rocks and mountains, or the hardened oak that rises out of the hanging cliff. A savage tigress, or the tempestuous ocean, such as it is now when swelled by gathering storms, gave thee birth. But whither can you shape your course, or how stem the force of opposing billows? You prepare to set sail, a stormy sea forbids: let me enjoy the blessing which a rough winter offers."

This is, of course, a fictional letter from Dido, Queen of Carthage to her lover Aeneas. It was written as part of a series of letters by Ovid, each one from a famous heroine in Greek and Latin literature to her absent husband or lover. Just goes to show you how good Ovid was as a writer.


Enough, More Later.
- James

A pair of ragged claws...

Currently in Earphones "Main Theme" from The Ususal Suspects Soundtrack by John Ottman (on endless repeat)

"Me miserum! certas habuit puer ille saggitas. / uror, et in vacuo pectore regnat Amor."
- Publius Ovidius Naso (Ovid), Amores 1.1, lines 25-26

"Miserable me! That boy has precise arrows. / I burn, and love reigns in my empty heart."

While Ovid wasn't considered the most honest poet about love (seeing that his Amores are highly sarcastic and his Ars Amatoria are essentially a guide to getting laid), I find pieces of his poems fitting out of context.

In the above mentioned, he very wittily writes about how he was going to write an epic poem, but Cupid came down and took a metric foot away from the second line of his couplets, transforming the poem from a Heroic dactylic hexameter to a Lyric construction.

"Damn you, Cupid!" he says, essentially, "Now I'm in love but with no-one to be in love with!"

I feel his pain on a Catullus-like level.

Enough, More Later.
- James