OVID'S AMORES

Less well-known, less often translated, and less scandalous than the Ars Amatoria, Ovid's Amores are gentle poems ""written at Cupid's dictation to catch the eye of Beauty."" The Amores are about love; falling in love, lovers' quarrels, jealousy, duplicity, happiness, and misery. The tone is whimsical; the style is graceful. The purpose of the Amores, unlike that of the Metamorphoses, is to amuse the reader. Guy Lee's translations reproduce not only the charm of the poems but also Ovid's awareness of the frivolity of his subject. Mr. Lee's poems have a gentle rhythm and succeed in imitating Ovid's stylized playfulness. Where Ovid used technical terms of love. Mr. Lee uses modern slang: ""to fix angry eyes upon "" ""becomes ""to look daggers at."" The translations fail only when they become overly literal. A useful set of notes, a biographical sketch, and some interesting comments on translating Ovid are appended.