[B-Greek] My Summer GREEK Need to read list

George F Somsel gfsomsel at yahoo.com
Sat Jun 5 22:11:08 EDT 2010


Perhaps we should drill a relief well.
 george
gfsomsel 


… search for truth, hear truth, 
learn truth, love truth, speak the truth, hold the truth, 
defend the truth till death.


- Jan Hus
_________ 




________________________________
From: Mark Lightman <lightmanmark at yahoo.com>
To: George F Somsel <gfsomsel at yahoo.com>; Louis Sorenson <llsorenson at hotmail.com>; greekstudy at nxport.com; B-Greek List mail to all <b-greek at lists.ibiblio.org>
Sent: Sat, June 5, 2010 7:09:24 PM
Subject: Re: [B-Greek] My Summer GREEK Need to read list


I was exaggerating only a little when I suggested that the ratio of Greek pages to English pages should
be 100 to zero, but if your goal is fluency, I would not even CONSIDER a ratio greater than 100 to 1.
(Or do I mean a ratio of less than 100 to 1?  I was told there would be no math on this list.)

Of course there are other reasons to read these books ABOUT Greek.  For some they hold inherent
interest.  But I will just say something that has been said many times on this list in many ways.  If none
of us ever improved our ability to read or use English by reading a book ABOUT  English, why in the
world do we think we need these books ABOUT Greek to improve our ability to read or use Greek?
How did THIS oozing spill of never ending analysis get started and how do we stop it?

Mark L



FWSFOROS MARKOS 




________________________________
From: George F Somsel <gfsomsel at yahoo.com>
To: Louis Sorenson <llsorenson at hotmail.com>; greekstudy at nxport.com; B-Greek List mail to all <b-greek at lists.ibiblio.org>
Sent: Sat, June 5, 2010 7:24:11 PM
Subject: Re: [B-Greek] My Summer GREEK Need to read list

I think you will find that you can't allot the amount of each on the basis of pages read.  If you are anything like me, I still read English much faster than Greek (or Hebrew) so I can cover more in an alloted time.  I would suggest a 2/1 ratio with Greek getting the most time.
 george
gfsomsel 


… search for truth, hear truth, 
learn truth, love truth, speak the truth, hold the truth, 
defend the truth till death.


- Jan Hus
_________ 




________________________________
From: Louis Sorenson <llsorenson at hotmail.com>
To: greekstudy at nxport.com; B-Greek List mail to all <b-greek at lists.ibiblio.org>
Sent: Sat, June 5, 2010 5:47:18 PM
Subject: [B-Greek] My Summer GREEK Need to read list


Hello all,

What to read and Why?  Reading about Greek without reading Greek is useless. What should the mix be? 1 page of Greek for 1 page about Greek? 1 page of Greek for 10 pages of English about Greek? The USB 4 has 886 pages of Greek.  At that rate I would have to read the Greek NT 10 times if I were to read Wallaces 763 page "Greek Grammar Beyond the Basics." But then again, no one would read much of any English book then, methinks.

But I'm not just going to read books about Greek. They are secondary to 
my reading Greek. I'm not abandoning the Read/Read/Read the Greek. 
Lets-Read-Greek (the name of my website) approach I think is essential. I don't think I'll come close to the 1 for 1 page because I can read English so much easier than Greek. But I will spend more time reading Greek than reading English. Should a historian read about history or read history? Should a student of Greek read Greek or read about Greek?

So what's on my Need-to-Read-Greek list this Summer? 
Something fun...
Something historical...
Something conversational...
Something classical...
Something biblical...
Something papyrical and inscriptional...
Something else...

(By the way, I'm not suggesting that one has to read all of the following - just some of the following or some from different and varied texts, like the ones listed below. First year students should try to read a little of many different types of books). Allen Wickgren's book, Hellenistic Greek Texts, gives a nice mix. If I were to read all the works below this summer, I would probably not get to reading books about reading Greek.

So here is my list................................What about yours???????????????  Will I get to it all?  Highly doubtful. But that is what lists are for. 

Something Fun....
Lucian's The Golden Ass. (I've read some of it before. I'll pass over the erotic love-making scenes, those parts are like reading a manual on how to put together a bicycle). There is a Loeb Library book Lucian Vol VII which has a parallel English-Greek diglott.  This is the story about a guy who gets turned into a donkey and suffers its fate. I could see a few Saturday Night Live skits about this one.

Something Historical...
Plutarch on Caesar (Plutarch is a Koine author and wrote a parallel lives of Caesar and Alexander). There is a commentary on this book -- I always want a commentary close by when I read any Greek book - NT or secular.

Something Conversational...
--Plato's Symposium. Geoffrey Steadman has a great reader on this, you can order it from him or send him an email and ask for his book (it is self-published). Email geoffreysteadman at gmail.com and ask for the pdf of his book. (Thanks to Mark Lightman for this link). I did, he was quick to send me an upload link. I think Plato is just the thing for the Greek songs I compose. I often need a syllable to fill in the meter, the particles (often one syllable) are used richly in Plato's dialogue. It is also conversational - and recommended by many scholars. And it is about Love. Who would not want to read about love?

Something Classical....
--Appolodorus:  https://perswww.kuleuven.be/~u0013314/apollodorus/index.htm A couple of people have recommended this. It is like reading the Greek myths in Greek. Have you seen the website http://www.theoi.com/? It's a good intro to Greek myths.

Something Biblical...
--Luke-Acts. I'm trying to write a parallel story to Athenaze using Luke's vocabulary in the setting of the 100 days before and after the crucifixion.  Athenaze is a two-year grammar (from Oxford Press) for high school students and has a lot of living language methodologies built-in. I'm considering using it next year. Who knows, maybe I'll call the stories Koinaze.    If you send me an email, I'll send you a couple of my first stories... llsorenson at hotmail dot com. 

Something Papyrical and Inscriptional.
--Moulton and Milligans The Vocabulary of the Greek Testament Illustrated from the Papyri.... (I've ignored this book too long.) I am going to start looking at his entries. You can get this book on the Internet Archive. http://www.archive.org/details/vocabularyofgree00mouluoft
--Allen Wickgren's Hellenistic Greek Texts has a nice collection of both on pages 130-140.  Plus he includes a vocabulary at the end. 

Something Else.
Epictetus' Enchiridion.  I led a GreekStudy reading group on the first half of this book before (I keep a lot of information on the Enchiridion at http://www.letsreadgreek.com/epictetus).  I want to read the second half and make a complete vocabulary of the whole book (another half-done project). Epictetus is literary Koine similar to the Greek of the book of Hebrews and Luke-Acts. The Enchiridion is about the same length of the book of Hebrews and is very similar in content to some of the moral imperatives of the NT. He even uses NT phrases. Epictetus talks about How do I deal with stress? What is important in life? Where do I fit in in the world? Is God important? It is one of the first self-help books of which we know. 


So how about you? Tell me what and why? 
OUX ELLHNISTI, ALL' AGGLISTI PARAKALW
Louis Sorenson



                        
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