The Lovers Assistant; Or, New Art of LoveHenry Fielding OvidOmniClassics · Literature
The Lovers Assistant; Or, New Art of Love
Henry Fielding OvidFielding turns Ovid's lessons in courtship into a satirical encounter between ancient Rome and eighteenth-century England.
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About the book
This prose adaptation of the first book of Ovid's Art of Love places an ancient instructor's confident advice within the social world of Fielding's own period. Classical stories coexist with contemporary settings and jokes, while scholarly-looking notes repeatedly become another instrument of comedy. The result is less a literal translation than a performance of how an old text can expose familiar modern behavior. The narrator's instrumental treatment of courtship is part of the work's historical and satirical character, and should not be mistaken for dependable advice about relationships. This edition includes Claude E. Jones's introduction, which explains the publication history and methods of adaptation. It prints the 1760 English text, checked against the 1759 issue, while omitting the facing Latin of the earlier edition.
- Classical adaptation
- Courtship as social performance
- Satire and learned authority
Why read it
The comic footnotes and mixture of ancient and modern references show Fielding using translation as an opportunity for social satire.
Augustan Reprint Society No. 89, edited by Claude E. Jones, 1961; English text from 1760