Milton and the Metamorphosis of Ovid contributes to our understanding of the Roman poet Ovid, the Renaissance writer Milton, and more broadly the transmission and transformation of classical traditions through history. It examines the ways in which Milton drew on Ovid's oeuvre, as well as the long tradition of reception that had begun with Ovid himself, and argues that Ovid's revision of the past, and especially his relation to Virgil, gave Renaissance writers a model for their own transformation of classical works. Throughout his career Milton thinks through and with Ovid, whose stories and figures inform his exploration of the limits and possibilities of creativity, change, and freedom. Examining this specific relation between two very individual and different authors, Kilgour also explores the forms and meaning of creative imitation. Intertextuality was not only central to the two writers' poetic practices but helped shape their visions of the world. While many critics seek to establish how Milton read Ovid, Kilgour debates the broader question of why does considering how Milton read Ovid matter? How do our readings of this relation change our understanding of both Milton and Ovid; and does it tell us about how traditions are changed and remade through time?

Maggie Kilgour's profile page

Maggie Kilgour is Molson Professor of English Language and Literature at McGill University where she teaches courses in Renaissance English literature, especially Milton, and the classical tradition. She is the author of two books, From Communion to Cannibalism: An Anatomy of Metaphors of Incorporation (1990) and The Rise of the Gothic Novel (1995).

"Every chapter in Kilgour's book offers something valuable, and the whole is richly informative and thought-provoking."

--Milton Quarterly

"Many will welcome [the author's] occasional interjections of dry humor. Scholars of both classical and early modern literature and advanced graduate students should find this book essential to study of Milton's relationship to Ovid and other writers of antiquity."

--Renaissance Quarterly

"A fine study of Milton and Ovid ... a skilfully woven work of criticism without a thread awry in its scholarly fabric."

--Erick Ramalho, Bryn Mawr Classical Review

"A rich and stimulating exploration of the implications of Milton's study of the Ovidian tradition for the substance and ambitions of his verse as a whole ... a suggestive general model of some of the ways in which poetry of the past is constantly given new life in the present."

--Notes and Queries

"A major achievement ... as timely as other creative reinterpretations of Ovid today, and, though a scholarly work, belongs to the same rich field of our own transformations and interpretations of Ovid."

--Goran Stanivukovic, Review of English Studies

"An intricate, thought-provoking study, rich with detail and numerous flashes of brilliant insight. ... [The author's] lively and engaging manner ensures that both students and scholars alike will find her book a pleasure to read. This fine study is a major achievement and a significant contribution both to Milton criticism and to the history of the reception of Ovid, one that opens up many promising avenues for further exploration."

--The Classical Review