Worlds from Words; Lives from Lines
Post date: Sep 27, 2016 4:53:32 AM
A common theme throughout the various stories encompassed in Ovid's Metamorphoses is the idea of voice and words. Frequently the ability to communicate either through actual voice or words is the decider of life or death. Ovid uses words as a way to express the identity and agency of characters and himself. When characters have a voice, they have control of the narrative and of themselves. When they lose their voice, they lose their identities. Echo uses her voice to distract Juno and pays the consequences with her voice. Echo can now only repeat what others say, and loses any control over her voice and identity. Eventually, "only voice is left of her... unseen by any, although heard by all; for only the sound that lived in her lives on" (III.512-515). The most important aspect of Echo is her voice. The same can be said of Actaeon. His transformation into a stag due to Diana's wrath took away his inability to communicate and therefore took away his way of showing his identity. Actaeon who was once the hunter became hunted by his own hounds. He longed to cry out but "the words betray him" and he is mauled to death (III.292-293). Io is able to overcome her inability to communicate by using the written word to tell "the sad story of her transformation" (I.901). This in the end saves her from her fate as a cow and allows her to find a way to transform back into her nymph form. Hermaphroditus changed in his identity from male to both male and female, losing his "virile" voice, but still able to gain a "consolation" by pleading to his parents that the pool that transformed him would also emasculate others (IV.525-527). Voice is at one with identity. When a character loses their voice, they must either adapt or lose their life.
Perhaps the greatest use of language in order to create and maintain identity and life is by Ovid himself. His Metamorphoses comes to a resounding end with the idea that through his work written here, he himself will become immortal. Through fame, forever will he live. Words are the most powerful thing in the entire Metamorphoses. Characters and Narrator alike use them to tell a story and influence the history and mythology of it. When one has words, when one has voice, one has control over their fate. Ovid uses his control to preserve his identity forever in his works.