The Roman Book of Days. Ovid (Publius Ovidius Naso, 43 BC–17 AD), born in Sulmo, studied rhetoric and law in Rome. Later, he engaged in public service, dedicating the rest of his life to poetry and society. Initially popular, he offended Emperor Augustus with his work Ars amatoria and was exiled because of this and other unknown reasons, settling in a cold and primitive city, Tomis, on the Black Sea. He continued to write poetry, a noble man living with restraint. He died in exile. Ovid's main surviving works are the Metamorphoses, a source of inspiration for artists and poets such as Chaucer and Shakespeare; the Fasti, a poetic approach to the Roman year, of which Ovid completed only half; the Amores, love poems; the Ars amatoria, which is not moral but clever and in parts beautiful; the Heroides, fictional love letters from legendary women to their absent husbands; and the melancholy works written in exile: the Tristia, appeals to individuals including his wife and also the emperor; and similar Epistulae ex Ponto. Poetry came naturally to Ovid, who at his best is lively, vivid, and clear. The edition of Ovid's Classical Library is in six volumes.