Remedia Amoris (Love's Remedy or The Cure for Love) [
c. 2 AD] is an 814-line poem in
Latin by
Roman poet
Ovid.
In this companion poem to The Art of Love,
Ovid offers advice and strategies to avoid being hurt by
love feelings, or to fall out of love, with a
stoic overtone.
Genre
Remedia Amoris fell into the Hellenistic category of
didactic poetry, often carried out on mock-solemn subjects.[1]
Goal and methods
Ovid's goal was to provide, for men and women alike, advice on how to escape safely from an unhappy love affair - emotional bondage - without falling into the tragic ends of such legendary figures as
Dido or
Medea.[2]
Among the techniques he suggested were: keeping busy; travelling; avoiding wine and love poetry (!); and concentrating on the beloved's defects rather than their strong points.[3]
Critical reactions
Alexander Neckam in the Middle Ages thought that De Remedio Amoris was the most important book of Ovid's for scholars to read.[4]
Victorian views, seen for example in the work of
Oskar Seyffert, generally adjudged The Cure for Love to be "as frivolous as it is original and elaborate...and no less offensive in substance and tone".[5]
The 20th Century generally took a more positive view,
H J Rose calling Ovid's instructions both frank and ingenious;[6] while from a different discipline
Eric Berne commended their continuing (metropolitan) practicality.[7]