The text and notes found in this volume are designed to guide any student who has mastered Latin at beginner’s level and wishes to read a selection of Apuleius’ text of the Metamorphoses in the original.
The extract chosen for this edition forms the core of the tale of Cupid and Psyche, one of the most famous stories embedded within the Metamorphoses. Apuleius is chiefly famous for being one of the great prose stylists of the Latin language: trained as an orator, educated as a philosopher, and deeply conscious of the literary heritage of the Latin language, Apuleius’ exuberance, playfulness and emotional effect can only be appreciated through a close reading and accurate understanding of his original language, coupled with a nuanced grasp of the tradition within which he was writing.
This edition contains a detailed introduction to the context of the Metamorphoses, supported by an in-depth examination of Apuleius’ literary techniques and a glossary of key terms. The introduction covers the historical and literary background to the Metamorphoses; as a second-century text written under the high empire, it is likely to be much later than any prose sixth-form students will have read before, and the introduction therefore covers key aspects of genre, literary sensibility, and intellectual and social outlook which make this text distinctively of its time.
The notes to the narrative itself focus on the harder points of grammar and word order, the rhetorical construction of Apuleius’ narrative, and the differences between Classical prose and Apuleius’ later Latin. While there is mainly a linguistic bent to the notes, there is also limited reference to the structural, rhetorical, and poetic devices of which Apuleius makes use, but these are kept to a minimum. Especially in an author as conscious of sound and style as Apuleius, it is hoped that students will soon learn to spot devices and techniques themselves. At the end of the book is a full vocabulary list for all the words contained in these sections.
There are many people without whose support this work would have not been completed, foremost amongst whom stands my wife, whose patience is truly Penelopean. I am deeply indebted to Alice Wright and her colleagues at Bloomsbury for all their help with this project. Thanks must also be expressed to the religious, royal and ancient foundation of Christ’s Hospital, which, more than merely supporting my work (especially in the form of its excellent Head of Classics, Ed Hatton), nurtured two of the great English Classicists whose scholarship underpins this commentary, E.J. Kenney and Stephen Harrison. I am immensely grateful to these and many others on whose shoulders I stand, and apologize for any errors or failings, which are undoubtedly my own.
Stuart R. Thomson
Eastertide 2017