The Golden Ass

Choose a favorite passage from Sarah Ruden’s translation of The Golden Ass. Then, find the passage in another translation, and compare and contrast. Why do you think these two translators might have made the different decisions they did? What effect do those decisions have on the way you understand this ancient novel?

Why might Apuleius have chosen the particular interpolated stories he inserts into The Golden Ass? How do they relate to the frame narrative? What themes do they pick up on, and how do they interact with Lucius’s own story?

Compare Lucius’s turn as an ass to that of another man-turned-donkey: Bottom, from Shakespeare’s comedy A Midsummer Night’s Dream. What does being turned into an ass mean in these different narratives?