Ovid
Ovid
Publius Ovidius Naso, known as Ovid in the English-speaking world, was a Roman poet who lived during the reign of Augustus. He was a contemporary of the older Virgil and Horace with whom he is often ranked as one of the three canonical poets of Latin literature. The Imperial scholar Quintilian considered him the last of the Latin love elegists. He enjoyed enormous popularity, but, in one of the mysteries of literary history, he was sent by Augustus into exile...
NationalityRoman
ProfessionPoet
love sports lying
Ovid lies here, the poet, skilled in love's gentle sport; By his own talents he worked his undoing. Oh, you who pass by, if ever you have loved, Think it not a burden to wish him calm repose.
work done
You put aside the work that's done, and seek some work to do.
gold genius wealth
Time was when genius was more precious than gold, but now to have nothing is monstrous barbarism.
nature men wind
Not for any one man's delight has Nature made the sun, the wind, the waters; all are free.
death birth cease
What we call birth Is but a beginning to be something else Than what we were before; and when we cease To be that something, then we call it death.
death lying men
Tis on the living Envy feeds. She silent grows When, after death, man's honor is his guard. So I, when on the pyre consumed I lie, Shall live, for all that's noblest will survive.
death sleep fool
O fool, what else is sleep but chill death's likeness?
sex chaste
Chaste is she whom no one has asked.
success succeed
Either attempt it not, or succeed.
delight ancient born
Let ancient times delight other folk, I rejoice that I was not born till now.
poetry letters jest
I have never injured anybody with a mordant poem; my verse contains charges against nobody. Ingenuous, I have shunned wit steeped in venom--not a letter of mine is dipped in poisonous jest.
love war
Leave war to others; 'tis Protesilaus' part of love.
love hate love-hate
I hate, and yet must love the thing I hate.
love hate struggle
Struggling over my fickle heart, love draws it now this way, and now hate that--but love, I think, is winning. I will hate, if I have strength; if not, I shall love unwilling.