The story of Ovid’s Metamorphoses revolves around the transformation of bodies into other bodies. This is shown by the following quote at the beginning of the story on pg 1138, lines 1-4: “My soul would sing of metamorphoses. But since, o gods, you were the source of these bodies becoming other bodies, breathe your breath into my book of changes.” Metamorphoses is considered the main theme of this story because many of these take place in this story. These transformations occur due to the transformed person and/or other people’s actions. The picture in the link above shows one of the several transformations that occur in which Daphne is turned into a tree. This transformation occurs in the Apollo and Daphne story in Book I. Daphne is turned into a tree because she asked her father for help because Apollo attempted to rape her. Daphne is turned into a tree by changing parts of her body into parts of the tree. This is shown by the following quote on pg 1141, lines 139-146: “As soon as she is finished with her prayer, a heavy numbness grips her limbs; thin bark begins to gird her tender frame, her hair is changed to leaves, her arms to boughs; her feet-so keen to race before-are now held fast by sluggish roots; the girl’s head vanishes, becoming a tree top. All that is left of Daphne is her radiance.”
My thought on this transformation of Daphne into a tree is kind of bizarre in the real world but also cool because you are turned into a different body. The transformation Daphne went through may reflect on her personality as well as qualities. The leaves may represent a means of escape since Daphne fled from Apollo due to the fact that leaves sort of look like wings.
The story of the Ramayana tells of the love Sita has for Rama. This story shows the perfect ideal couple. Rama is brave, wise, and hard-working, and Sita is generous, beautiful and loyal. But during the story, Rama questions the love Sita has because he sees her with another man. Sita tells Rama he is the only one she loves, but Rama does not believe her pureness. He goes on a quest and Sita follows him. He rescues her, but still thinks shes cheating on him. She tells him that they have 2 kids together, but Rama still banishes her. When Rama sees that Sita is being treated badly by the king Ravana, he saves her from him. After he learns of his 2 kids, he accepts Sita and they reunite. A theme of this story is dharma. In ancient India, indians followed the principle of dharma and it is exposed in the story. Here is a picture of Rama and Sita together.
The story of Apollo and Daphne tells the story of how Apollo is in love with Daphne. Apollo, in the beginning of the story, talks to Eros and sees his love arrows. He is struck with the love arrow and begins falling in love with Daphne. Daphne begins to flee, but Apollo becomes more in love with her. Apollo gets impatient and begins chasing her down. Once Apollo catches her, Daphne turns into a tree. Apollo stills embraces the tree and makes its a sacred tree. He makes it his tree. The theme of this book as well as all the other books in metamorphases is about transformation.
“hear me, great ones of Uruk, I weep for Enkidu, my friend, bitterly moaning like a woman mourning I weep for my brother, O Enkidu, my brother” (pg. 28). The image shows the low point of Gilgamesh’s life which caused him to go on a journey to find an internal life. Although he obviously failed in that, he did find achieve something much more important. Going off on that journey he was mourning, bitter, proud, and pretty much out of control as a ruler. When he returned he obviously made peace with himself and his fate. Gods gave him an Enkidu who was his equal and then the gods took him away when he became the most dear to Gilgamesh. The unfairness of this might feel very familiar to anyone who ever lost a loved one. The rage, the feeling of how very real death is, and how frightening. Gilgamesh saw death with his very own eyes in the eyes of his beloved brother. Using his immortal strength he tried to defeat death but fortunately, he makes peach with himself as a mortal and gathers wisdom from that as king.
In The Iliad Achilles lacked so many moral standards. One of which was that he saw his slave girl as just a symbol of status and not as a person. We know this because when she was stolen, there was never any proof that he actually loved her. When Agamemnon stole his slave girl away, he almost killed him and not because he was emotionally tied to the girl, but because he didn’t like that Agamemnon was practicing a higher authority over Achilles. It bothers me that for so long women have been so suppressed that they barely had any status at all. Though even as the fact that women aren’t valued high in status, they still have major contributions to conflict. They are so powerful that even while being suppressed, they are able to make men fight over them with their beauty. Women contribute to a huge factor in the pride of a man and so even while not saying a word, she is able to start a war. Men underestimate our power greatly, and even when they think it is them that has the control, they aren’t prepared. 
