<p>This study examines the reputation and influence of Ovid's Metamorphoses in Augustan England in order to show the persistence of the allegorical reading of the poem. Although the ultimate purpose of the study is to shed light on the interpretation of Restoration and eighteenth--century poetry, such a direct application of the metamorphic tradition to the reading of the verse cannot be undertaken before the critical position of the Metamorphoses in the intellectual and artistic milieu of the period has been determined. Because it is my contention that Ovid's poem continued to be read in the Augustan age in much the same way that it had been in the Renaissance, the study begins with an analysis of the relationship between classicism and Renaissance humanism and the way in which this relationship affected Restoration and early eighteenth century thought and writing. From there, the study briefly reviews the sixteenth and seventeenth century thought on the Metamorphoses and, then branches into Augustan criticism, prefaces, translations, editions and handbooks which discuss Ovid's poem and which are written by British authors and continental writers who influenced British thought. It has sometimes been assumed that the Metamorphoses died an early death in the Augustan age because of the travesties of the poem and because of Addison's seeming disavowal of allegorization; therefore, I have tried to correct this assessment by a comprehensive analysis of the materials of the period.</p> <p>The study shows that while the critics have been correct in their belief that science and antiquarianism, along with a certain hatred of heathenism and narrowly defined sexual mores, caused the popularity of the Metamorphoses to wane in the eighteenth century, the poem still held a considerable prestige among writers and artists until 1750. Garth's 1717 Preface to the Metamorphoses, from which authors borrow freely until Boyse's New Pantheon (1753), is the seminal essay on Ovid's poem for the early eighteenth century, and his allegorical reading of the poem and appreciation of Ovid's wit are representative attitudes toward the poem. By 1750, however, Ovid's classic began to be questioned by men like Spence because it deviated from the true picture of the heathen mythology, and, consequently, the Metamorphoses in the later eighteenth century become the sole realm of schoolboys. While historians like Banier and Boyse believe the Metamorphoses to be significant in the early century, by 1750 the historians, too, sought more authentic materials, but writers clung to Ovid as a poetical model and moral teacher at least until that time. Allegory justified the continued usage of Ovid artistically and morally, and ubiquitous use of the Metamorphoses in Augustan poetry testifies to its popularity and significance.</p> <p>A careful examination of the comments on the Metamorphoses indicates that the truths that critics may gather about the scientific progress of an age are not always applicable to the artistic situation of the times. Furthermore, to confirm a thesis, one must go beyond the mere perusal of a few works of the period. In the case of Ovid, Addison's disparaging comment on the allegorization in Ross's Mystagogus Poeticus has been taken as the damaging evidence against the allegorical iv reading of the Metamorphoses, whereas Addison intends his criticism mainly for "mystical" allegory. By a careful study of a number of eignteenth-century works a clearer and more valid picture emerges. The importance of such a study for literary purposes lies in its applicability to the poetry of the period, As I have tried to argue in the last chapter of this thesis, Ovidian matter is not a mere window-dressing for frivolous poems, but an integral part of the structure and meaning. By applying the moralized reading of the Metamorphoses to allusions in poems such as Astraea Redux or The Dunciad and to the metamorphic patterns in such poems as Claremont, The Fan and "Eloisa to Abelard", I have discovered in Augustan verse a moral texture which the well-read poets submerged in subtle allusions, not immediately apparent from a casual reading of the poems. Although travesties and burlesques of Ovid's Metamorphoses were published in the eighteenth century, his master work continued to be regarded a major poetic document, and even those poets who used his work for the purpose of travesty often did so to make a serious point.</p> / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)