In Which the Latin *Clicks*
(This is probably going to bore everyone except Steph, Caelus, and the Celticist Roommate to tears. Fair warning.)
My MA class is full of strong Latinists. Some have over twelve years of the language under their belts. I am not one of these students. I have 1.6667 academic years* (I dropped the third quarter) of Latin at Chicago, and was a pretty mediocre student because I was lazy about memorizing, almost never prepared (until Dmitri and I started studying together, but then we were lazy and relying on online dictionaries), and trusted in my instincts from three years of the chant choir and eleven years of Spanish. I know I'm good at languages-- my Welsh abilities prove that I'm talented with at least one difficult language-- but Latin is a struggle, and an ever more frustrating struggle because it is a language that I want to love.
Em the younger (the Catholic one, for those of you keeping score at home) assured me, all through August and September, that one day my Latin would "click" and I would realize that I actually do know this language. But it wasn't happening, and it wasn't happening, and it wasn't happening, and I wanted to hit my head against the wall because the simplest Latin-- say, that inscribed above the altar at the oratory-- remained a puzzle I couldn't solve. This was true, at least until this past Shrove Tuesday, when I was checking the mass times on their website and it read as if it were English, "my house will be called a house of prayer".
So, yay me, I can read Vulgate Latin when all the words are words I know. This is actually progress, which makes me quite happy until I begin beating my head against Hugh of St. Victor and he makes me want to die-- at least until today, when an unfamiliar verb proved to me that I am, actually, getting better at it. "I think that's a second person present verb," I thought to myself, "'vilipendo, vilipendare?' But wait! It's in an 'ut' clause, so it's probably subjunctive! vilipendo, vilipendere!**"
It's not in my Classical dictionary, but it is in Whitaker's Words: vilipendo, vilipendere: despise, slight. A small victory, but one which proves that I am getting better at looking carefully at the syntax and at the morphology, rather than flying by the intuitive seat of my pants. The next step, of course, is turning these little victories into motivation to spend more time studying the boring memorization stuff.
IN OTHER NEWS: a whole bunch of Chicago girls were in town visiting Em the Elder. We had a lovely dinner on Saturday night for which I made dessert: poached pears, chocolate sauce, and ice cream. Em enjoyed reliving her math major days with Amanda, who is doing math at MIT, and there were many references to Amanda's obsession with prime numbers, and Em's childhood prejudice against the same. The best part, however, came later.
Amanda: I do, in fact, know someone who got married on March 14th, at 1:59 pm.*** And this man has reproduced!
There was much approving of Kilt Boy, and there is other exciting news from the New York faction which involves knitting itty-bitty hats, and sweaters, and booties...
*Taken out to the fourth decimal place, like a U Chicago GPA.
** No comments on how I should have realized that it's a compound on pendo, pendere allowed.
*** 3.14159, for those who have to think about it for a minute, as I did.
My MA class is full of strong Latinists. Some have over twelve years of the language under their belts. I am not one of these students. I have 1.6667 academic years* (I dropped the third quarter) of Latin at Chicago, and was a pretty mediocre student because I was lazy about memorizing, almost never prepared (until Dmitri and I started studying together, but then we were lazy and relying on online dictionaries), and trusted in my instincts from three years of the chant choir and eleven years of Spanish. I know I'm good at languages-- my Welsh abilities prove that I'm talented with at least one difficult language-- but Latin is a struggle, and an ever more frustrating struggle because it is a language that I want to love.
Em the younger (the Catholic one, for those of you keeping score at home) assured me, all through August and September, that one day my Latin would "click" and I would realize that I actually do know this language. But it wasn't happening, and it wasn't happening, and it wasn't happening, and I wanted to hit my head against the wall because the simplest Latin-- say, that inscribed above the altar at the oratory-- remained a puzzle I couldn't solve. This was true, at least until this past Shrove Tuesday, when I was checking the mass times on their website and it read as if it were English, "my house will be called a house of prayer".
So, yay me, I can read Vulgate Latin when all the words are words I know. This is actually progress, which makes me quite happy until I begin beating my head against Hugh of St. Victor and he makes me want to die-- at least until today, when an unfamiliar verb proved to me that I am, actually, getting better at it. "I think that's a second person present verb," I thought to myself, "'vilipendo, vilipendare?' But wait! It's in an 'ut' clause, so it's probably subjunctive! vilipendo, vilipendere!**"
It's not in my Classical dictionary, but it is in Whitaker's Words: vilipendo, vilipendere: despise, slight. A small victory, but one which proves that I am getting better at looking carefully at the syntax and at the morphology, rather than flying by the intuitive seat of my pants. The next step, of course, is turning these little victories into motivation to spend more time studying the boring memorization stuff.
IN OTHER NEWS: a whole bunch of Chicago girls were in town visiting Em the Elder. We had a lovely dinner on Saturday night for which I made dessert: poached pears, chocolate sauce, and ice cream. Em enjoyed reliving her math major days with Amanda, who is doing math at MIT, and there were many references to Amanda's obsession with prime numbers, and Em's childhood prejudice against the same. The best part, however, came later.
Amanda: I do, in fact, know someone who got married on March 14th, at 1:59 pm.*** And this man has reproduced!
There was much approving of Kilt Boy, and there is other exciting news from the New York faction which involves knitting itty-bitty hats, and sweaters, and booties...
*Taken out to the fourth decimal place, like a U Chicago GPA.
** No comments on how I should have realized that it's a compound on pendo, pendere allowed.
*** 3.14159, for those who have to think about it for a minute, as I did.
3 Comments:
Yay Alice!! That's really exciting!!
I'm actually experiencing a frustration similar to yours except in Old English - where I didn't figure out until it was pretty much no longer worth the effort that "Read this chapter in Bright's Grammar" meant "Memorize all the paradigms therein". So I know O.E. through using it to translate, still have nothing more than an intuitive grasp of the verb system and a vague understanding of case. (Mainly, it's what I want it to be.) It kind of works for a basic translation, but not to the point where I understand the subtleties I want to understand (what's ambiguous, and what's just wrong, etc?).
I think learning a dead language produces the most immediate results when students are plunged headfirst into translation, but if one is willing to set aside immediate results for a more solid foundation for later mastery... grammar grammar grammar. Memorization, memorization, memorization. The problem is, I don't think college courses ordinarily give you time to let you do that. Definitely not enough time to focus on it, at least.
But clearly, having an intuitive reaction concerning an ut-clause is a very very good sign that your grammatical details are filling in despite the weak points of college courses. Way to go!
By
Stephanie, at 10:48 PM
Wow, the world is small. If the Amanda recently visiting is the one I think she is (and how many such U(C) grads could there be?), I had no idea that you knew her. Also, I wish I were as brilliant as she. And wow, getting married on pi-day is a bit much...
By
anna, at 11:36 PM
Io, io, io!
By
Caelius, at 2:12 PM
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