[B-Greek] Greek: "A Mere Plague and Torment"
Carl W. Conrad
cwconrad at artsci.wustl.edu
Fri Jan 11 07:51:44 EST 2008
My morning blog-scan came to the old curmudgeon (Michael Gilleland,
self-styled Laudator temporis acti, http://tinyurl.com/2p5tv7) and
lighted upon this interesting citation from Andrew Lang, notable
elsewise and as a scholar and translator of Homer):
"As to Greek, for years it seemed a mere vacuous terror; one invented
for one's self all the current arguments against "compulsory Greek."
What was the use of it, who ever spoke in it, who could find any sense
in it, or any interest? A language with such cruel superfluities as a
middle voice and a dual; a language whose verbs were so fantastically
irregular, looked like a barbaric survival, a mere plague and torment.
So one thought till Homer was opened before us."
No, not Homer Simpson, but the blind bard of Chios, as tradition
speaks of him, rightly or wrongly. I suspect that many a seminarian
would harbor the same notion that ancient Greek is "a mere plague and
torment." And while the ability to read the NT in its original tongue
is undoubtedly a prime desideratum for them, I think it remains a
valid observation that reading Homer, once one has scaled that lofty
peak, is a sheer joy and delight -- all that Keats found even in
Chapman's translation.
Carl W. Conrad
Department of Classics, Washington University (Ret)
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