Muse upon unequal wheels
The title of this article borrows the metaphor employed by Ovid to define the metrical,
visual and auditory disproportion characteristic for elegiac couplets. He himself
used this meter in his Ars amatoria instead of the traditional hexameter to underline
the amusing character of his quasi-parodic poem composed as a literary joke.
Different approaches to translating this metaphor and Ovid’s text are discussed. The
author analyses the literary tradition in order to demonstrate how to keep the form
of the Polish version as close to the original as possible without making it seem
unnatural. The translation should differ from traditional Polish epic forms. Therefore,
the author experiments with prose and thirteen syllables verse with aabb rhymes or
with abab rhymes. In this way she can investigate advantages as well as limitations
of these forms. Consequently, she chooses the verse of thirteen syllables with abab
rhymes, which cannot be found either in the tradition of Polish heroic poetry or in
the tradition of its translation.

The title of this article borrows the metaphor employed by Ovid to define the metrical,
visual and auditory disproportion characteristic for elegiac couplets. He himself
used this meter in his Ars amatoria instead of the traditional hexameter to underline
the amusing character of his quasi-parodic poem composed as a literary joke.
Different approaches to translating this metaphor and Ovid’s text are discussed. The
author analyses the literary tradition in order to demonstrate how to keep the form
of the Polish version as close to the original as possible without making it seem
unnatural. The translation should differ from traditional Polish epic forms. Therefore,
the author experiments with prose and thirteen syllables verse with aabb rhymes or
with abab rhymes. In this way she can investigate advantages as well as limitations
of these forms. Consequently, she chooses the verse of thirteen syllables with abab
rhymes, which cannot be found either in the tradition of Polish heroic poetry or in
the tradition of its translation.