The Last Poems of Ovid | Page 8

estates or his house in Rome. This leads to Ovid's request:
atque utinam possis, et detur amicius aruum,?remque tuam ponas in meliore loco!?quod quoniam in dis est, tempta lenire precando?numina perpetua quae pietate colis.
(21-24)
He then attempts to compensate for the boldness of his request. First he says that his appeal is unnecessary:
nec dubitans oro; sed flumine saepe secundo?augetur remis cursus euntis aquae.
(27-38)
Then he apologizes for making such constant requests:
et pudet et metuo semperque eademque precari?ne subeant animo taedia iusta tuo
(29-30)
He ends the poem with a return to the topic of the benefits Pompeius has already rendered him.
The letter to Suillius addressing Germanicus
No poem in the fourth book of the _Ex Ponto_ is addressed to a member of the imperial family, but the greater part of IV viii, nominally addressed to Suillius, is in fact directed to his patron Germanicus. Suillius' family ties with Ovid and his influential position would have made it natural for Ovid to address him in the earlier books of the _Ex Ponto_ or even in the _Tristia_; and it is clear from the opening of the poem that Suillius must have distanced himself from Ovid:
Littera sera quidem, studiis exculte Suilli,?huc tua peruenit, sed mihi grata tamen
In the section that follows, Ovid asks for Suillius' assistance, rather strangely setting forth his own impeccable family background and moral purity; then he moves to the topic of Suillius' piety towards Germanicus, and in line 31 begins to address Germanicus with a direct request for his assistance. In the fifty-eight lines that follow he develops the argument that Germanicus should accept the verse Ovid offers him for two reasons: poetry grants immortality to the subjects it describes; and Germanicus is himself a poet. In this passage Ovid allows himself a very high level of diction; as the topic was congenial to him, the result is perhaps the finest extended passage of verse in the book[7].
[Footnote 7: Professor R. J. Tarrant points out to me in particular that lines 63-64 on the apotheosis of Augustus being in part accomplished through poetry are one of the few instances in the poetry of exile of Ovid's earlier mischievous irony towards Augustus--a sign of a return on Ovid's part to his earlier form.]
Ovid ends his address to Germanicus by asking for his assistance; only in the final distich of the poem does he return to Suillius.
The letters to Brutus and Graecinus
Only two of the ten addressees named by Ovid in _EP_ IV were recipients of earlier letters from him. Brutus, to whom IV vi is addressed, was also the addressee of _EP_ I i and III ix, while Graecinus, to whom IV ix is addressed, was the recipient of _EP_ I vi and II vi.
There is some difference between Ovid's treatment of Brutus and Graecinus in _EP_ IV and in the earlier poems. _EP_ IV vi is highly personal, being mostly devoted to a lengthy description of Brutus' apparently conflicting but in fact complementary qualities of tenacity as a prosecuting advocate and of kindness towards those in need; no poem in the fourth book of the _Ex Ponto_ is more completely concerned with the addressee as a person. In contrast, nothing is said of Brutus in _EP_ I i, where he acts as the mere recipient of the plea that he protect Ovid's poems, or in III ix, where Brutus is the reporter of another's remarks on the monotony of Ovid's subject-matter. The address to Graecinus in IV ix, on the other hand, is much less personal than in I vi and II vi. The part of _EP_ IV ix concerned with Graecinus describes his elevation to the consulship, and was clearly written (in some haste) to celebrate the event. The earlier poems are more concerned with Graecinus as an individual: in _EP_ I vi Ovid describes at length Graecinus' kindliness of spirit and his closeness to his exiled friend, while in II vi Ovid admits the justice of the criticism Graecinus makes of the conduct which led to his exile, but thanks him for his support and asks for its continuance.
The letters to Tuticanus
The two letters to Tuticanus show a similar dichotomy.
Of the two poems, xii is more personal and more concerned with poetry. The first eighteen lines are a witty demonstration of the impossibility of using Tuticanus' name in elegiac verse, while the twelve verses that follow recall their poetic apprenticeship together. In the final twelve lines, referring to Tuticanus' senatorial career, Ovid asks him to help his cause in any way possible.
Poem xiv is far less personal than the earlier epistle. The only mention of Tuticanus is at the poem's beginning:
Haec tibi mittuntur quem sum modo carmine questus?non aptum numeris nomen habere meis,?in quibus, excepto quod adhuc utcumque ualemus,?nil te praeterea quod iuuet inuenies.
The bulk of the poem is a defense against