Why I never see any thread about Latin literature posted here?
I know you anglofags are always concerned on postmodernism and other philosophical thoughts of this kind, but that's why I see so often people assuming dichotomous views or being too self assured.
You all guys need some Horace and a lot of Metriotes in your life.
Everything good about the Romans, they stole from the Greeks.
That's why.
>>8070018
So what?
>>8069995
Virgil's Aeneid is great.
>>8070041
/thread
>>8070018
Classics are very diverse and I don't think it's fair to say the Romans stole from the Greeks, they took a lot, and I mean a lot of influence from them, but they innovated as well
Poets like Ovid and prose Writers like Petronius are obviously influenced pretty heavily by your Hesiods and Aristophanes, but they were also highly original, even innovative writers that pioneered new genres of literature, especially in the case of Petronius.
Greeks are overrated? Let's not forget that he Romans have had some of the best poets in the history of mankind- Lucretius, Horace, Virgil and so fort. I'm currently reading "De Rerum Natura" in English, and I'm using the commentary on the latin text. I'm also following the latin text, I know how to read it, I learned Latin in highschool. I'm progressing very slowly, but I'm not in a hurry, it's a beautiful text with mangificent insight and poetic constructions. Also, what I like about it is that it doesn't shy away from the bad things in life and doesn't provide false solace, but gives a sober look on things, although sweetened with the honey of poetry. I'm going, I think, to try to read Horace next.
>>8069995
>I know you anglofags are always concerned on postmodernism and other philosophical thoughts of this kind, but that's why I see so often people assuming dichotomous views or being too self assured.
anglosaxon and american solipsism is something classical culture must cure
>>8070041
MULTUM OLIM?!
So somehow the pious Aeneas has ALREADY SUFFERED MUCH in the days STILL TO COME??
>>8069995
who gives a fuck about latin lit
not me
>>8070122
Lucretius is beautiful man, I finished reading it through the first time a few months ago and have re-read him twice since then. I love that old-fashioned, sonorous sort of Latin that he wrote.
The end of the poem is very interesting. After all this stuff about living a life worthy of the gods he finishes with this horrible account of the Plague of Athens. Make of that what you will.
Right now on the side of Cicero's De Oratore I'm reading Martianus Capella's De Nuptiis Mercurii et Philologiae. Martian was a lawyer in Carthage in the early 5th century and wrote this work as a sort of Satyrical encyclopedia of the liberal arts (satire in its more ancient and primitive sense) and it was hugely influential in the early middle ages up to Charlemagne. Within a very elaborate frame-story about the wedding of Mercury and Philology, the seven liberal arts each feature as characters, expositing their particular particular branches of learning in depth.
It is absolutely freakish. His verse is actually more beautiful and easier to understand than his prose. Omnia monstra facit. He really is a goddamn Martian, at least to someone schooled in the Latin of the golden age.
Dum crebrius istos Hymenaei versiculos, nescio quid inopinum intactumque moliens, cano, capillis respersum albicantibus verticem incrementisque lustralibus decuriatum, nugales ineptias aggarrire non perferens, Martianus intervenit dicens...
While I sing repeatedly those verses of Hymenaeus, laboring after something unexpected and untouched, Martianus interrupts, not bearing a head sprinkled with white hairs and decuriated by lustral intervals to babble inept foolishness, saying...
How old is the man Martian interrupts?
It's marvelous stuff. If I was reading it in English I'd read a couple of pages and say "weird" and never open it again, but in Latin I feel like an adventurer in treacherous and little-traveled lands.
>>8071809
Olim can refer to the future, pleb.
Plautus: audire edepol lubet. St. Primum omnium olim terra quom proscinditur
Cicero: utinam coram tecum olim, potius quam per epistulas!
Horace: non si male nunc et olim Sic erit,
When you get down to it the reason there are hardly ever any threads about Latin literature (as opposed to "how do I learn Latin?", which you see at least once a week) is that there are probably fewer than ten people with any real competency in the language who come to this website.
And there's a good reason for that. Latin is pretty much useless. There's better philosophy in other languages, there are better historians in other languages, there are equal poets in other languages, etc. Some people are interested in it for its own sake but it's rare. Reading Cicero in the original IS pretty special and it's trite to say that he doesn't stand up well in translation, but is it really worth 3+ years of hard labor just to be able to read Cicero, and not even totally fluently?
Some of us are just hooked by the language and its lit, like some people get hooked on comic books, and I like to think we get more out of this than a comic book collector, but I wouldn't expect many people to follow after us.
>>8072035
I like to think of my study of Latin the way a Jew might think of his study of Hebrew. It's the well-spring of my culture. And some of my editions of the Classical auctores are as burdened with exegesis and commentary as any Talmud. When you start seeking after the medieval glossators you know you've gone off the deep-end.
>>8072102
omg you so intelligent and deep m8
>>8070041
Aeneid is objectively worse than both the Iliad and the Odyssey
>>8072035
>not being familiar with spring awakening
>not realizing that's the entire point of the exchange
