Description

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Lucius Apuleius (c. AD 123-c. AD 180), was a Romanised Berber who is best remembered for his bawdy picaresque Latin novel The Golden Ass, otherwise known as the Metamorphoses. It is the only Latin novel which has survived in its entirety, and is an imaginative, irreverent, and amusing work which relates the ludicrous adventures of one Lucius, who experiments in magic and is accidentally turned into an ass. In this guise he hears and sees many unusual things, until escaping from his predicament in a rather unexpected way. Within this frame story are found multiple digressions, the longest among them being the well-known tale of Cupid and Psyche. Apuleius' first work, the Apologia (A Discourse on Magic) was written in his own defence after being accused of using magic to gain the attentions (and fortune) of the wealthy widow he married. Other works include On the God of Socrates, Florida, On Plato and his Doctrine, and possibly On the Universe.