Having emerged from a past in which it was marginalised, forgotten and even vilified, Ovid's Fasti is currently enjoying an extended moment in the sun: recent interest in this intriguing work of aetiological poetry has produced not only articles and monographs, but also new English translations. The W.'s new effort joins the translations of Nagle (1995) and Boyle & Woodard (2000) and takes its place alongside them as a valuable new resource for students, teachers and enthusiasts of Ovid. The deceptively slim volume seems TARDIS-like, bigger on the inside with rich content even while it is disarmingly slight in physical size and weight. It is no ponderous, intimidating tome, and this enhances its overall accessibility; once past the front cover, the merits of the W.'s book become readily apparent. The winningly colloquial prose translation of Ovid's kaleidoscopic poem is front and centre, but the accompanying slate of supplemental materials is also helpful to the reader.
In terms of the translation itself, the choice of prose is the most apparent difference between the W.'s Fasti and the other current English renderings. While the 1929 translation by Sir James Frazer is in convoluted, quixotic prose, its utility today as a literary resource is severely limited. The W.'s take a different approach altogether with overarching goals of clarity of expression in lucid English and faithfulness to Ovid's Latin: the guiding principle ‘has not been to interpret Ovid's words, but to represent them as accurately as we can’ (p. xxxiii). Nevertheless, every translation is also an interpretation as well as a creative work in its own right, and this one clearly bears the stamp and personality of its co-creators. The tone of the English is informal and conversational, sprinkled with contractions and colloquialisms, and as such is readily approachable. For instance, pauper ubique iacet (1.218) becomes ‘the poor man's out of it everywhere’ (p. 6); quicumque iocis non alienus est (1.396) is rendered as ‘whoever wasn't averse to a bit of fun’ (p. 10); non habet exactum quid agat (3.637) turns into ‘she hasn't got it quite worked out what she should do’ (p. 56); and substiterat (4.254) is ‘she had stayed put’ (p. 69). While some critics may perhaps take issue with the tonal liberties taken, the benefit is the rendering of Ovid into a natural modern idiom, not persistent stilted artifice.
The volume provides a number of useful reading aids. Foremost among them is the arrangement of the prose into clearly delineated paragraphs, each of which contains a discrete idea as expressed in the poem. This simple yet profound decision provides valuable visual cues to help the reader make the transitions among Ovid's innumerable and quickly shifting topics. Other useful supplements include a carefully chosen selection of secondary sources, a glossary and index of names, a listing of major mytho-historical events in the Fasti organised by internal chronology, and an introduction that discusses with clarity and economy major contextual topics. The tone throughout is determinedly informal, which seems to be purposefully exploding expectations of dry academic exposition and replacing them with zestful turns of phrase such as the descriptions of Mars as ‘macho but ill at ease’, Flora as ‘ingenuous and very fanciable’ (p. x) and the Anna Perenna tale of Book 3 as ‘wonderfully cheeky’ (p. xviii). The introduction avoids discussing literary-critical interpretations, though one remark may strike some scholars as debatable: ‘[Ovid] was playful, as always, but there is no need to think he was subversive’ (p. xix). Ovid and the idea of subversion together have always been a contentious pair.
The W.'s translation does contain some infelicities of language, though these criticisms are largely subjective. All the same, these moments can interrupt the otherwise elegant flow of the prose. For instance, fecundae … dextrae (2.427) becomes the awkward ‘right hand that fertilizes’ (p. 29), aedem non magni … Iovis (3.448) becomes the overly literal ‘temple of “not-big” Jupiter’ (p. 52), and amnis it insana, nomine Gallus, aqua (4.364) is rendered ‘a river called Gallus runs with crazy water’ (p. 71), a phrase that seems more a comic deflation than a translation. In several places, word choice lacks a certain grace: nullo solicitante (4.396) becomes ‘without anyone's stimulus’ and cetera luxuriae nondum instrumenta uigebant (5.279) is ‘the rest of luxury's equipment wasn't yet flourishing’ (p. 58), a rather ungainly result. Thankfully, such lapses are rare.
The publication of the W.'s fresh and energetic translation should be welcome news to all readers with an interest in Ovid the operosus dierum uates, the diligent poet of Roman days, and his effort to capture in poetry a glimpse of being Roman throughout the wheeling year with all its times and reasons.
