Ovid: Epistulae ex Ponto Book I

Epistvlae ex Ponto 1.1

Ovid opens and closes the three-book collection with a letter to Brutus, to whom Ex P. 4.6 is also addressed; little is known of him (see Syme 1978: 80). Because O. appears to entrust the collection to him (see 3.9.51–6), he may have served as the poet's literary agent in Rome. To be sure, O. addresses not only Brutus but readers of the whole collection, to which this elegy serves as an introduction. In a sense, the Epistulae ex Ponto are a continuation of the Tristia: rebus idem, titulo differt (17), we are told; yet this collection of letters also recalls O.'s earlier collection of Epistulae Heroidum. Like his abandoned heroines of legend, O. earnestly importunes his addressees. He does not conceal their names as in the Tristia; now he calls attention to their unwillingness to be named (19–20), despite the embarrassment or even danger that may attach to association with the exiled and disgraced poet.

The elegy falls into three parts. In the first (1–36), the poet begs acceptance in Rome for his poetry-book. In the second (37–58), he presents begging priests of Isis, the Magna Mater and Diana as images of his own lot, continuing to plead for acceptance of the collection while making a transition to the third part (59–80), in which he expresses deep regret for his culpa and hopes for mitigation of his exile by a change of place.