An Imaginary Life Summary

The Roman poet Ovid states that he used to see the Child—whom locals call the “wild boy”—when he was young himself. They spoke together in some unknown language. Even as Ovid got older, the Child stayed the same age. Ovid never told anyone else about the Child, and when Ovid grew into a man, the Child disappeared.

As an adult, Ovid lives in Tomis, a small village on the edge of the Roman Empire, leagues from anything like a city. He hates it. The landscape is barren and untamed; the village is sparse and colorless. None of the villagers speak Latin and Ovid cannot speak their language, which further isolates him. Ovid lives in exile under care of the village headman, Ryzak. Though he was once an important social figure in Rome, his rebellious poetry offended Emperor Augustus, who banished him to Tomis. One day, Ovid sees a lone red flower in the village and recognizes it as a poppy. The remembered name in his mind and the splash of color on the ground makes Ovid decide that he must “transform[]” himself in his new world.

Compared to Ryzak’s power and toughness, Ovid thinks that he himself is weak and useless, made soft by his life of comfort and leisure. Ovid accompanies Ryzak and the other hunters to the birchwoods to hunt deer, though Ryzak has to teach him how to ride a horse without a saddle. Before they reach the birchwoods, the villagers visit their resting grounds, where generations of horsemen have been laid to rest. Ryzak shows Ovid how to honor the dead by riding through the funerary mounds, shouting and throwing grain as an offering. Although Ovid does not believe in gods, he feels a certain thrill during the ritual. When the hunters reach the birchwoods, a tracker points out a bare human footprint in the snow, alongside the deer tracks. Ryzak explains through hand signals that the prints belong to a “wild boy” whom the villagers have seen in the forest for the past two years. Ovid has many questions, but cannot ask any of them due to the language barrier. He spots the child in the underbrush and some hunters try to catch the boy, but they cannot. They hunt for the rest of the day and return to Tomis.

Winter comes and goes. Ovid finds the season dreadful, since everyone simply huddles in their huts for the long months until the snow begins to thaw, bracing against occasional raids from barbarian tribes. Ovid senses that the boy is the same Child he knew when he himself was a child, and presses Ryzak to send out a search party in the spring. The villagers are too busy working and acquiring food, however. In the fall, when the hunters return to the birchwoods, they find no sign of the Child. Ovid worries that he died in the previous harsh winter. Soon, it’s winter again, and the season passes into spring. Ovid begins to understand some of the villagers’ language and realizes that its form is very different from his native Latin. Latin divides and explains, while the villagers’ language simply observes life as one unified thing and accepts it. That fall, in the birchwoods, Ovid spots the Child again. Ovid longs to meet him, but the other hunters seem afraid of the boy. At night, Ovid leaves a bowl of gruel out for the Child. He dreams that he is a pool of water in the dirt from which a deer and the Child drink. Meanwhile, the Child eats from Ovid’s bowl—waking up and seeing this, Ovid hopes that the boy is now connected to the human world, having eaten from a man-made vessel.

Another year passes and Ovid grows strong, sturdy, and well-versed in the village language. He begins to appreciate the simplicity of life in Tomis and even the subtle range of colors in the landscape. With his new language, the world appears different. He plants a little garden of wildflowers near his hut. The women in the village think he is foolish, since flowers serve no utility for survival, and Ovid mourns the fact that the villagers have no concept of “play.” That winter, Ovid convinces Ryzak to send a search party in the spring and bring the Child back to Tomis. When the winter thaws, riders catch the boy in the birchwoods and bring him back. He shrieks and howls until the shaman chants to him, setting the Child into a long, deep slumber.

For the first two weeks, the Child, though awake, lies passive in Ovid’s hut. The villagers fear the boy, thinking that he possesses an animal spirit or perhaps is a werewolf. After two weeks, Ovid senses that the Child’s intelligence is beginning to awaken. He watches curiously as Ovid writes with pen and ink, and even experiments himself with the tools. Ovid begins taking the Child out into the marshes, toward the River Ister, where he tries to teach the Child to make human sounds and the Child shows him how to make animal calls. Ovid notes that when the Child makes a bird call, he seems to become rather than merely imitate the bird in that moment. Thus, Ovid hopes that if the Child can form human words, he will become a man. The Child continues to teach Ovid about animals and plants. Ovid decides he will teach the Child the language of Tomis, which confirms in Ovid’s mind that he will never return to Rome. He tries to understand the Child’s way of thinking, of identifying himself with nature rather than thinking of himself separately from it, but he struggles to let go of his sense of self.

As the winter approaches, Ovid worries about the effect that it will have on the Child, since they will have to stay inside all winter with Ryzak and his family. Ryzak assures Ovid everything will be alright, but Ryzak’s mother, “the old woman,” fears the Child and thinks he carries a demon. When the snow starts to fall and Ovid tries to bring the Child inside, the Child becomes hysterical, screaming and scratching at the walls until he exhausts himself and falls asleep. For weeks, the Child will not speak or move and only stares into the gloom. Ovid frets that they are losing any progress they made during the summer.

The Child develops a bad fever that causes him to convulse. He seems unaware of his surroundings. Ryzak’s mother thinks it is the demon trying to emerge, perhaps looking for a new body to possess. She warns everyone to stay away from the Child and Ovid worries she will kill the boy if given the chance. Ovid watches over him for days on end as the Child grows weaker and continues to convulse. During a particularly bad seizure, Ryzak’s daughter-in-law defies the old woman and helps Ovid care for the Child. The Child begins to recover, but Ryzak’s grandson Lullo falls ill instead, and even the daughter-in-law (Lullo’s mother) fears that the Child’s demon has passed into her son. Ovid watches fearfully, thinking that if Lullo dies, both he and the Child will be in great danger. Lullo recovers after many days, but then Ryzak falls ill with fever instead. The old woman finds a set of small teeth marks on Ryzak’s wrist, which she interprets as the place where the demon entered his body. Ryzak convulses as well, making sounds that sound inhuman, even to Ovid. To prevent the demon from taking control of Ryzak’s spirit, the village elders decide to kill him themselves. During the process, which involves an elaborate ritual, Ovid takes the Child and flees Tomis, knowing that their lives are now in danger since the village blames the child for their leader’s death.

Ovid and the Child cross the River Ister into the northern wilderness, where the barbarian tribes roam. Rather than mourning his loss of another home, Ovid feels as if he is fulfilling his destiny, embarking on the journey that will bring his final transformation. He and the Child travel for months with no destination, not even counting the days as they pass. The Child grows stronger now that he is back in the wilderness, and Ovid feels as if he now understands the unspoken language of nature that the Child tried to teach him. The universe seems interconnected and whole—Ovid senses that he himself is just one part of it, like a stalk of grass. Ovid can feel his body failing in old age. He is dying. However, as the Child cares for him in his last days, Ovid feels “unbearably happy” because the Child is now free. Ovid understands that by dying, he is returning to the earth from whence he came and being restored to nature so that his body can feed the soil. He feels timeless and “bodiless,” complete.