In Book V the narrative veers away from Bacchus and tells the story of Perseus, who escapes an angry mob by using the head of Medusa to turn them all to stone. Then we fly with Minerva to visit the Muses, who relate the tale of the human sisters who challenged them to a story-telling contest, lost, and were transformed into magpies as punishment. Is there any connection between all these events? Or are we listening to some elevated version of bar-talk, where one rambling story segues into the next with only the loosest symbolic or emotional attachment? This is one of the many questions we ask ourselves here. We also engage in a long discussion about the voice of the rape-victims – does the story of one such victim, who relates her plight in heart-rending language, reveal the fundamental violence of Ovid’s gods in some new way? And we consider the character of the Ovidian world more generally; a world made up of endless stories, without a clear through-line or central theme. Too post-modern for you? Take it up with James Joyce.