Ovid and Plato is the latest product of the recent, productive and fascinating trend in Ovidian studies that tries to find philosophical implications and models in the work of this Augustan poet. K. illustrates the theoretical core of his book with an artwork, Daphne by Kate MacDowell (p. 2). This sculpture represents the destruction of Gianlorenzo Bernini’s marble group Apollo and Daphne, isolating the statue of the girl, of which only some fragments are recognisable – fragments by which the spectator can infer her story: her frightened and beautiful face, her hand that is turning into a laurel branch, her legs already changed into a trunk. Thereby this fragmentation enables both recognising the model and providing a disruptive reading of it. This is what Ovid did with Graeco-Roman philosophy according to K.
After the theoretical introduction (Chapter 1), the book deals with the origin of the world (‘Chaos and Creation’, Chapter 2), its cyclical destruction (‘Turbulent Worlds: Phaethon and the Flood’, Chapter 3), the opening of the Fasti (‘Janus and the Many Worlds’, Chapter 4), the model of the world provided by Archimedes (‘Archimedes and the Model Universe’, Chapter 5), the end of the Metamorphoses (‘Pythagoras: The Early Lives’, Chapter 6), love as a philosophical force (‘The Philosophy of Desire’, Chapter 7), and the reading of exile (‘The Exile of Philosophy’, Chapter 8). A final chapter is devoted to Ovidian reception (‘The Afterlife of Ovid and Plato’, Chapter 9). The book is completed by a bibliography (including only works written in English), an index of passages and a general index.
The book covers all Ovidian production, from the Metamorphoses (Chapters 2–3 and 6) to the Fasti (Chapters 4–5), the erotic works (Chapter 7) and the ones produced in exile (Chapter 8). As far as subjects are concerned, it may be divided into two parts: the first deals with cosmological issues, which are also structural ones, since they are related either to the opening or to the end of Ovid’s main poems (Chapters 2–6). These interests match the prominence, among the Platonic dialogues, of the Phaedo, the Theaetetus and the Timaeus. In the second part of the book K. tries to apply his interpretative perspective to the main subjects of Ovid’s other works (Chapters 7–8).
Chapter 2 deals with the generation of the universe, described in Met. 1 as a gradual organisation of an indistinct mass into the four elements; in this regard Ovid’s reference to deus et … natura (Met. 1.21) alludes to Plato’s demiourgos as described in the Timaeus (esp. 30a2–6). K. focuses on this parallel, stressing how the poet ‘disturbs the hierarchy between model and copy and order and chaos as found in the Timaeus’ (p. 41). However, K. does not consider the possibility that l. 21 might also allude to the Stoic idea of deus sive natura, expressed both by Cicero (e.g. Par. 14) and by Seneca (Nat. 2.45.3; Benef. 4.7.1: quid enim aliud est natura quam deus et divina ratio …?) (as it has been noted by scholars since F. Bömer, P. Ovidius Naso: Metamorphosen [1969], pp. 18–19). Indeed, Ovid challenges Plato’s theory by mixing arguments from different philosophical schools, without letting readers get their favourite ones. This is something K. admits later, regarding the opening of the Fasti (Chapter 4, p. 63: ‘The oscillation between different philosophical systems … allows for competing and conflicting ideologies to coexist’; cf. also Chapter 5, p. 91).
Plato’s Timaeus is the focus of Chapter 3. This Platonic dialogue provides Ovid not only with the myth of Deucalion and Pyrrha, but also with an account of that of Phaethon. In this case, as in Chapter 2, K. opportunely highlights the connections between the opening book(s) of the Metamorphoses and the last one, including Pythagoras’ speech about metempsychosis. In this case, too, Ovid’s reading is dark and chaos-oriented, in contrast to Plato’s struggle for freeing the soul from the burden of the body.
Chapter 4 deals with the opening story of the Fasti, that is the speech of Janus about the origin of the universe. This is a stimulating chapter, especially in relation to the proposed parallel with the myth of Cronus in Plato’s Politicus, in turn a reading of Empedocles’ theory of Strife. This parallel enriches the reading of the Janus episode.
In Chapter 5 K. tackles the story of Archimedes and the armillary sphere in Fasti 6. K. provides a fine interpretation, pointing to Cicero as a mediator between Plato’s Timaeus and Ovid, so that the craftsman represents a minor-scale demiourgos. K. then widens the perspective to representations of cosmos in Plato’s Phaedo on one side and Ovid’s Fasti 6 and Metamorphoses 1 on the other: the coexistence of different models and interpretations is thus enriched by a metapoetic perspective, in that Ovid’s literary creativity is a demiurgic ability.
Chapter 6 is devoted to Pythagoras’ speech in the final book of Ovid’s Metamorphoses. Based on statements in Cicero’s works (Tusculan Disputations and Academica), K. stresses the links between Pythagoras and Plato, but also between Pythagoras and Empedocles. His discussion of metempsychosis in Met. 15 focuses on the parallels with the myths narrated in Plato’s Meno and Republic, but also in the Timaeus. More generally, the idea of a cosmic flux of beings is connected with Empedocles, Plato’s Timaeus and Lucretius.
The shift of attention from the major Ovidian poems to his erotic poetry in Chapter 7 implies a parallel transition among Plato’s dialogues, from the Timaeus to the Phaedrus and the Symposium. This is true not only for the theoretical background of love poetry, but also for the stories of, for example, Narcissus and Hermaphroditus.
In Chapter 8 K. turns his attention to the works written in exile, combining well-known issues, such as the self-comparison with Socrates made by Ovid in Tr. 5.12, and original ones, such as a parallel between this elegy and the second letter attributed to Plato. K. opportunely nuances his theory, leaving open the possibility that the motive of burning one’s own writings may represent a commonplace rather than a literary allusion to Plato’s Second Epistle.
Chapter 9 is devoted to how the eleventh- and twelfth-century reception of Ovid closely linked him to Plato, or better Neoplatonism, as it was known at the time.
The book lacks a conclusion, which could provide a red thread of ‘disturbing realities’ across the chapters. Indeed, in some cases, especially in the last few chapters, the manipulation and challenge of the Platonic model are not clear. Despite these minor issues, I would strongly recommend this book, not only for its fresh perspective on Ovid and Plato, but also for its evaluation of Lucretius and Cicero among Ovid’s models, both directly and as a lens through which Ovid reads Plato. In these respects it significantly enriches the breadth of Ovidian studies.
