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The Metamorphosis of Ovid’s “Metamorphoses”
Posted by DCA Theater on June 30, 2009 in Other, Summer Opera
Submitted by Stephen Raskauskas, Production Dramaturge
As Joanie Schultz mentioned in yesterday’s post, Handel’s Acis and Galatea was inspired by Ovid’s Metamorphoses. Ovid, the ancient Roman poet, wrote the Metamorphoses as a collection of myths and fables which all feature a transformation or metamorphoses. The vivid imagery of Ovid’s poetry and of the tales he tells has inspired countless operas, artworks, poems, and songs since it was first written in the 1st century and nearly ever creative thinker from Shakespeare to Strauss has adapted some part of the Metamorphoses.
Handel adapted several stories into stage works, including Apollo and Dafne, Hercules, and of course, Acis and Galatea. The story of Acis and Galatea is told in Book XIII, and describes how a buffoonish cyclopes, Polyphemus, tries to woo Galatea, a nymph, away from her lover Acis, a shepherd. When Acis and Galatea vow their eternal love for one another, the jealous Polyphemus crushes Acis with a bolder. Galatea uses her powers to change her lover’s flowing blood into a river, so that he can live eternally, even if he is not hers. The story was adapted by Alexander Pope, John Gay, and John Hughes, by combining their own poetry and translations of Ovid with a famous translation of the Metamorphoses by John Dryden. Their libretto – the words of the opera – is a true poetic masterpiece unto itself.
Of course, the Chicago Cultural Center’s Summer Opera production of Acis and Galatea will put an interesting twist on this classic myth by updating the story; yet another metamorphosis of Ovid’s Metamorphoses.
Images of the Acis and Galatea myth from a 1703 edition of the Metamorphoses which Handel may have known
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