Ovids Elskovskunst – håndbog i hor blev udgivet i 1 f.Kr. og er en lærebog i kærlighed, erotik, flirt og nydelse. Nonchalant og veloplagt indleder den latinske digter Ovid med ordene: Findes der nogen i byen, der ikke kan kunsten at elske, kan man studere det her digt for at blive ekspert. Ovids Elskovskunst er en blanding af praktiske råd om hygiejne, tøj, frisurer, kosmetik og samlejestillinger, krydret med fornuftig og charmerende vejledning i gode manerer, selviscenesættelse og erobringsstrategier. Samtidig rummer digtet begavede hentydninger til græske og romerske myter, men fremfor alt er der ingen hævede pegefingre, for i Ovids Elskovskunst er der lige så mange forskellige måder at elske på, som der er mænd og kvinder. Det er også væsentligt, at både mand og kvinde skal føle nydelse. De to første dele i bogen er henvendt til mænd, mens tredje del rådgiver kvinder om stort og småt i det, som Ovid ser som leg og nydelse. Ovid var allerede en feteret og populær digter, da han publicerede sin lærebog. Publikationen var dog på grænsen til, hvad magthaveren kunne tolerere, og Ovid blev sendt i eksil. Han blev dog ikke glemt af den grund, men blev læst og læses forsat. Ovids Elskovskunst – håndbog i hor kan læses med digterens skæbne i baghovedet, eller man kan blot lade sig inspirere og more sig.
Author
Publius Ovidius Naso (20 March 43 BCE – CE 17/18), known as Ovid (/ˈɒvɪd/) in the English-speaking world, was a Roman poet best known for the Metamorphoses, a 15-book continuous mythological narrative written in the meter of epic, and for collections of love poetry in elegiac couplets, especially the Amores ("Love Affairs") and Ars Amatoria ("Art of Love"). His poetry was much imitated during Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, and greatly influenced Western art and literature. The Metamorphoses remains one of the most important sources of classical mythology. Ovid is traditionally ranked alongside Virgil and Horace, his older contemporaries, as one of the three canonic poets of Latin literature. He was the first major Roman poet to begin his career during the reign of Augustus, and the Imperial scholar Quintilian considered him the last of the Latin love elegists. He enjoyed enormous popularity, but in one of the mysteries of literary history he was sent by Augustus into exile in a remote province on the Black Sea, where he remained until his death. Ovid himself attributes his exile to carmen et error, "a poem and a mistake", but his discretion in discussing the causes has resulted in much speculation among scholars. Ovid's prolific poetry includes the Heroides, a collection of verse epistles written as by mythological heroines to the lovers who abandoned them; the Fasti, an incomplete six-book exploration of Roman religion with a calendar structure; and the Tristia and Epistulae ex Ponto, two collections of elegies in the form of complaining letters from his exile. His shorter works include the Remedia Amoris ("Cure for Love"), the curse-poem Ibis, and an advice poem on women's cosmetics. He wrote a lost tragedy, Medea, and mentions that some of his other works were adapted for staged performance. See also Ovide.
