detritus vandentis
jsqu...@gmail.com
empty cup of coffee left behind by a player who
had left the game. "What is that?" another
player asked, pointing at the cup. I was folded,
and, much to my surprise, I found myself coming
out of my folded reverie with "detritus vadentis"
as a spontaneous response.
Gee, maybe the language isn't completely dead.
Does "detritus vadentis" work as a humorous
description of the abandoned coffee cup?
detritus exituus?
Johannes Patruus
Not quite, because "detritus" in Latin does not appear to carry the
meaning that it has in modern English. And "vandentis" looks like a
mispelling.
Patruus
Ed Cryer
"Johannes Patruus" <inv...@invalid.invalid> wrote in message
news:7pgnjn...@mid.individual.net...
Rubbish would be "purgamentum" or "quisquiliae". I think "vadere" is
appropriate. I always think of "Quo Vadis?" Said of St Peter scurrying
away from Rome and the outbreak of persecutions against Christians. At a
certain spot on the Via Appia.
Relictum abeuntis (vadentis).
Ed
jsqu...@gmail.com
Thanks.
Right you are. I mis-spelled. I need to form the
absolute habit of editing myself.
As to "detritus" not having the same meaning in
English that it has in Latin, I feel that the Latin
meaning works.
the literal translation I make,
"Detritus vadentis" ==> a rubbed off of a going
a shedding of a going
etc.
, gives me the meaning that came to mind as I re-focused
on the table after having folded, having let my mind wander
a bit, and coming to see the cup as anew.
What surprised me was that I came up spontaneously with
some Latin, be that Latin right or be it wrong. This brings to my
mind,
in a new perspective, that old question
"Is Latin dead?"
I suppose that what had happened was that my immediate response,
looking at the half empty cup, was "detritus". I have always been
partial to that word because it seems to often be more appropriate
than words such as ........? You see, none other works as well.
"detritus" then, in turn, seemed to reach out to my limited Latin
with a quick "vale", "vadens", "exitus" and the like.
The genitive, surprise, surprise, came automatically, and I
found
"detritus vadentis"
shaking the air......
...................."Is Latin dead now to me?"
jsqu...@gmail.com
> "Johannes Patruus" <inva...@invalid.invalid> wrote in message
Thanks. What you suggest is closer to what most would
expect me to mean. Actually, much to my surprise, I found
myself briefly thinking in Latin, and the Latin connotations
of "detritus" were what I meant. The senses of
rubbing off
shedding
droppings
etc.
seemed appropriate to the process whose result was
that cold, sour, half cup of coffee, and my recollections
of him, the leaver.
What intrigued me about this meaningless cup incident
was that, as I left some sort of between-hands mental reverie and came
into focus on the question "what is that?", the coffee
cup sent me briefly into Latin and I found myself saying,
without any real thought, "detritus vadentis".
Ed Cryer
<jsqu...@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:db0cd1aa-5565-4fff...@j9g2000prh.googlegroups.com...
Thanks.
etc.
"Is Latin dead?"
"detritus vadentis"
shaking the air......
****************
Very good, jsquare. I think I see what you're getting at. But I have to
object. You see, I studied Latin right up to BA level, and I frequently
get whole passages of Vergil, Horace et al. occurring to me in social
situations.
BUT, BUT. If I voiced them aloud to the others with me, they'd say
"What?".
So, you see, I've had a personal meaningful experience, and then
enhanced it with relationship to my classical studies. But it's
personal; a private lingo of my own inner world.
OK, so it's not dead to me. In fact I'll carry it to the grave; be
thankful to the education system that gave it me, the many teachers who
taught me, the great and long-lasting interests I've had from it, the
insights into history, humanity and language itself. But it stays a
private language with my self; or, rather, a kind of cultural tinsel to
make the experiences sparkle more.
You seem to be building on onomatopoeic Latin; and you'd find many words
in that class. But you'll find many more whose meaning depends entirely
on fellow users of the language.
Let me take your "detritus vadentis" as an example. I'm into Ciceronian
Latin. Cicero doesn't use "detritus"; he uses "contritus". But
Quintilian used it a century later in the same sense of "trite" or
"hackneyed".
So the best I could make of it would be "a trite man of one going". And
that is a million miles from your personal invention.
Ed
jsqu...@gmail.com
> <jsqua...@gmail.com> wrote in message
Very interesting, and also perceptive. Yes, indeed my
Latin is somewhat a bastard child of my English and
my Spanish.
I have to ask, however, why not go from "detritus vadentis" to
"a leaving of leaving",
instead of your
"a trite man of one going"?
Remember here, please, that the context was that of
an abandoned coffee cup not that of whomever
abandoned it.
.
That is, the first "leaving" of my translation is an Eng. nounal
present participle,
with the semantics of "deposit", "sediment", "sloughing off", etc..
The second "leaving" of my translation is an Eng. verbal
present participle,
with the semantics of "going away", "departing", etc.
My "detritus vadentis" stood somewhere between
English and Latin.
Cicero is presently way beyond me; I am at the
Gallic wars level of Latin. Maybe you know of a book made for those
who can't manage Cicero but would like to try? In particular, maybe
you know
of a book which focuses on the spoken sounds of Cicero's
Latin?
Johannes Patruus
> Maybe you know of a book made for those
> who can't manage Cicero but would like to try?
http://www.archive.org/details/firstorationcic00cicegoog
Patruus
Ed Cryer
<jsqu...@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:361a9077-1a50-4a21...@u25g2000prh.googlegroups.com...
*****************
Personally I find your poetic outlook far preferable to cold linguistic
philosophy. It reminds me of that Robin Williams film "Dead Poets
Society".
It's the same with "Arma virumque cano". You can pull it apart
linguistically; reduce it to its constituent parts, as if there'd be
nothing left thereafter. But there is; a vast deal; the human spirit.
John Keats died of consumption in Rome, in a house on the Spanish Steps.
He wrote this;
A thing of beauty is a joy for ever:
Its lovliness increases; it will never
Pass into nothingness; but still will keep
A bower quiet for us, and a sleep
Full of sweet dreams, and health, and quiet breathing.
Therefore, on every morrow, are we wreathing
A flowery band to bind us to the earth,
Spite of despondence, of the inhuman dearth
Of noble natures, of the gloomy days,
Of all the unhealthy and o'er-darkn'd ways
Made for our searching: yes, in spite of all,
Some shape of beauty moves away the pall
From our dark spirits.
Ed
Ed Cryer
<jsqu...@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:361a9077-1a50-4a21...@u25g2000prh.googlegroups.com...
In particular, maybe
you know
of a book which focuses on the spoken sounds of Cicero's
Latin?
********
Video
http://tinyurl.com/ygcez49
Text - [33] onwards
http://tinyurl.com/296hxz
Ed
jsqu...@gmail.com
Those are some of my favorite lines.
Thanks.
What becomes of a culture that no longer
knows such words?
Speaking of good lines, and speaking more
contemporaneously, Tom Waits has been
know to put out a few. His poetry is meant
to be spoken.
"Hang on Saint Christopher"
"Good Old Earth'
for example, are favorites of mine. If you do not
already know these songs, you might enjoy
lending them your ear.
Altho he is not considered a poet, Cormac
McCarthy writes so well that his prose
can pass as poetry. I place him with
the very best English authors such as
Conrad, Shakespeare, etc.
The borders between good spoken poetry and good
spoken prose are not distinct.
jsqu...@gmail.com
I'll check out "arma virumque cano" in my book
"Amo, Amas, Amat" which is a collection of
Latin phrases and sayings. It should be there.
I suspect that I will
still need to get back to you to know what your
translation/interpretation is.
jsqu...@gmail.com
>
> or to describe the observed:
>
> poculum cafei ad medium plenum a lusore modo discesso relictum.
>
> I think that "vadentis" implies that the deserter is still on his way
> out the door.
>
> Eduardus
Good. I like that. It uses a word,
"reliquiae", which perks one's English
ear as does "detritus". That leaves the
listener with his attention caught and
not quite certain if he is hearing English
or not. "Discessi" also has that desirable
property of sounding familiar.
So, overall, "reliquiae discessi" does the
job I intended better than does "detritus
vadentis".
BTW, your comment
"I think that "vadentis" implies that the deserter is still on his way
out the door. "
bridges us into the concept of the "historical present".
As I use "vadentis" in "detritus vadentis" it is somewhat
poetically referring to an abstract, ongoing,
historical, present which has a property of leaving
traces smeared in time. Sort of like Browning's "clouds of glory".
Anyway, I very much like your "reliquae discessi"
as it does the job for poker table coffee cups
insofar as they deserve some Latin thrown at them,
and are to more than stand and wait..
Ed Cryer
"Ed Cryer" <e...@somewhere.in.the.uk> wrote in message
news:hh2ten$4jn$1...@news.eternal-september.org...
That speech is my personal favourite of Cicero's. There's a point later
where he exclaims "o immoderata mulier!". And he must have stood right
in front of her in the court, and appealed to the jurors there.
Now, that woman was the sister of Publius Claudius (who renounced his
patrician status and adopted the plebeian name of "Clodius" to further
his political career). Cicero lived next door to him up on the Palatine
hill, in a house that he got on the cheap through a multimillionaire
speculator. And Cicero must have seen it all; all the orgies, the mobs,
the degradation and dragging in the dirt of Rome's great name. He lost;
and went into exile. But Clodius got murdered by a rival gang, and
Cicero came back.
Those class divisions have been here in very recent British history. You
get two people gazing at each other across a courtroom; both convinced
they're in the right, but married to different perspectives on life,
different values of what represents good and bad, right and wrong.
Cicero, the arch-conservative who believed in Rome's great past when men
didn't pursue wealth and luxury, but rather the Stoic virtues
encapsulated in "virtus" (notice the relationship "vir"/"virtus"); and
Clodius who was on the left with Caesar and the tribunes of the people.
And they waged political warfare throughout the Roman constitution, each
faction making the best of the powers they had.
And the Res Publica collapsed in chaos and warfare. From which the
Principatus emerged.
Ed
jsqu...@gmail.com
> "Ed Cryer" <e...@somewhere.in.the.uk> wrote in message
>
> news:hh2ten$4jn$1...@news.eternal-september.org...
>
>
>
>
>
Well you have certainly opened a whole bag of worms
with your "arma virumque cano", and I thank you
for that. The issues raised for me by those three
words will take quite a while to resolve as they
delve into more than just the linguistics of Latin.
Googling on
"arma virumque cano syntax"
has produced several hits that will take
a while to read and think about.
For now, suffice it to say that I find
"arma virumque cano" surprisingly easy
to digest and that it is a style of Latin which
seems quite natural in its use of compound
enclitics.
I expect to get back to you on this when I
have gone into it some more.
jsqu...@gmail.com
>
> or to describe the observed:
>
> poculum cafei ad medium plenum a lusore modo discesso relictum.
>
> I think that "vadentis" implies that the deserter is still on his way
> out the door.
>
> Eduardus
death words. "Remains of the dead" works
very well for that forlorn, sour, mostly empty coffee
cup because it is over the top in a naturally humorous
way. That was my original intent in throwing some
spontaneous Latin at a piece of styrofoam.
BTW, could you see also using the gerund
genitive? I see this alternative form as introducing
the semantics of an historical present as tho the
abandoned cup points at more than the one
player who has departed.
jsqu...@gmail.com
I have pursued "arma virumque cano" a bit.
To get around the troubles I have with including
multiple URL's in "Posts" made on this site,
I have resorted to the device of posting an email
to myself:
Ed Cryer
<jsqu...@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:601d9229-1f6e-449f...@z41g2000yqz.googlegroups.com...
http://mail.google.com/mail/?shva=1#inbox
***************
Fantastico y maravilloso, jsquare!
You get my award of 2009 for most inventive and poetic posting in
alt.language.latin!
Well, that really is a private language.
Now all I need is your user name and password.
Ed
jsqu...@gmail.com
PASTE the email I sent to myself.......
This article
http://www.theamericanscholar.org/the-historical-present/
discusses the historical present usages
in Virgil's Aeneid. Despite having a knowledge of Latin
less than needed to deal with the Aeneid by Virgil,
I do have a sense that the best translation of
"arma virumque cano" is made in the historical present.
In particular, the article makes the same translation that
I prefer, after struggling a bit with that curious "..umque":
"Wars and a man I sing"
Quoting further from the article"
"Fagles’s opening, “Wars and a man I sing” is both
rhythmically familiar and shocking; with “Wars,”
Fagles gives notice that this will be a violent Aeneid
from its in-medias-res beginning to its open-ended finish."
Partly because I am somewhat dyslexic, I am partial
to the historical present. It seems often to have
more impact than most varieties of the past tense
because it draws the reader in.
As to the compounding of enclitics found in
"virumque", I have little objections. It seems to
me, as a native speaker of English, that this
device busts Latin free of an overly schoolish
and rigid framework, and that it is quite elegant
in its conciseness. There seem to be quite
a few articles on this issue to be found via
feeding Google
" arma virumque cano syntax "
These articles interest me because they see
"virumque" as an example of syntax and grammar
linguistic issues which are not unique to Latin.
They will take quite a while for me to digest.
What Virgil does to Latin with his "arma virumque cano",
then, for me at least, seems
to enhance Latin. I wonder why not do similarly with
English? Has English moved too far away from its
inflected roots to have all the power that is inherent
to it?
jsqu...@gmail.com
Am I correct in thinking that this
will give me the Latin and the English on facing pages?
If so, it looks like a real bargain to me.
Ed Cryer
<jsqu...@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:9c4211cd-f4c7-4609...@k19g2000yqc.googlegroups.com...
Yes, that's a standard Loeb edition. But the most famous books of the
Aeneid are in volume I, books II, IV & VI.
This is John Dryden's famous opening;
Arms, and the man I sing, who, forc'd by fate,
And haughty Juno's unrelenting hate,
Expell'd and exil'd, left the Trojan shore.
Long labors, both by sea and land, he bore,
And in the doubtful war, before he won
The Latian realm, and built the destin'd town;
His banish'd gods restor'd to rites divine,
And settled sure succession in his line,
From whence the race of Alban fathers come,
And the long glories of majestic Rome.
It's the meter that draws me. Those are rhyming iambic pentameters; and
iambics seem as natural to English epic poetry as dactylic hexameters do
to Latin.
It's something to do with differences in the two languages themselves.
You can have iambic hexameters, as in Milton;
Of man's first fall I sing and that forbidden fruit
You can even have catalectic iambics, as with Hamlet's;
To be or not to be that is the question
(where the hanging half-foot adds to the strangled emotions).
Ancient Greek could do both with equal ease; iambics for dialogue in
tragic plays; dactylic hexameters for epic poetry.
French tragedy of Racine and Corneille uses iambics. I don't know of any
modern language wherein dactylic hexameters seem good. I've seen a
couple of attempts in English, but very unsatisfying.
It's a phenomenon that I've not seen adequately explained.
Ed
Johannes Patruus
> Am I correct in thinking that this
>
> http://www.amazon.com/Virgil-II-Appendix-Vergiliana-Classical/dp/0674995864/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1261937939&sr=1-1
>
> will give me the Latin and the English on facing pages?
Scroll down and look at the Customer Reviews, and there you will find the
answer.
Patruus
John W Kennedy
> You can have iambic hexameters, as in Milton;
Those are generally referred to as "Alexandrines".
> Of man's first fall I sing and that forbidden fruit
I know some of Milton's abandoned attempts are preserved; is this one of
them? The finished "Paradise Lost" is in pentameter.
"Of Man's first disobedience, and the fruit
Of that forbidden tree whose mortal taste
Brought death into the World, and all our woe,
With loss of Eden, till one greater Man
Restore us, and regain the blissful seat,
Sing, Heavenly Muse...."
Alexandrines are not commonly used in English, except, sometimes, to
serve as a stanza end in a pentameter context (especially in the
Spenserian stanza), or a sort of paragraph-ending mark.
> You can even have catalectic iambics, as with Hamlet's;
> To be or not to be that is the question
> (where the hanging half-foot adds to the strangled emotions).
That's not regarded as a half-foot in English prosody, but simply as a
feminine ending.
> French tragedy of Racine and Corneille uses iambics.
Yes, albeit with a distinctly different rhythm from the English sort,
something like the following improvisation:
The little fishes swim about their bowl, I see
And little know the cares that trouble you and me.
I wonder what it would be like to be two fishes
With neither property nor debts nor even wishes.
In an English-speaking theater, I rather fancy, the tomatoes would be
flying after two minutes of such oily stuff.
> I don't know of any
> modern language wherein dactylic hexameters seem good. I've seen a
> couple of attempts in English, but very unsatisfying.
> It's a phenomenon that I've not seen adequately explained.
Latin and Greek have long and short vowels. To the extent that modern
Western languages have long and short syllables at all, it is in
consequence of consonant clusters.
These lame hexameters the strong-wing�d music of Homer!
No�but a most burlesque barbarous experiment.
When was a harsher sound ever heard, ye Muses, in England?
When did a frog coarser croak upon our Helicon?
Hexameters no worse than daring Germany gave us,
Barbarous experiment, barbarous hexameters.
-- Tennyson
Boito does pretty well in Italian, though. (Note: the passage below is
as actually sung in his opera, "Mefistofele". Some of the lines are
chopped, compared to the printed libretto. I have a copy of the original
somewhere.)
ELENA [ assorta in una fatale visione ]
Notte cupa, truce,
Senza fine, funebre!
Orrida notte d'Illio!
Implacato rimorso!
Nugoli d'arsa
Polvere al vento
Surgono e fanno
Pi� cieca la tenebra.
CORETIDI
Pace!
ELENA
Di cozzantisi scudi
E di carri scroscianti
E di catapulte sonanti
L'etere � scossa!
S� muta il suol
In volutabro di sangue.
CORETIDI
Numi! Numi!
ELENA
I numi terribili
Gi� ruggono,
L'ire inferocendo
Della pugna;
L'ispide torri
Ergonsi tragiche, negre,
Fra la caligin densa.
CORETIDI
Elena!
ELENA
L'incendio gi� lambe le case.
Veggonsi l'ombre degli Achei
Proiette bui profili giganti
Vagolar le pareti
In mezzo ai roghi.
Ahim�! Ah!
Alto silenzio
Regna poscia
Dove fu Troia.
--
John W. Kennedy
"The blind rulers of Logres
Nourished the land on a fallacy of rational virtue."
-- Charles Williams. "Taliessin through Logres: Prelude"
Ace0f_5pades
> Next to me at a recent poker game was a half
> empty cup of coffee left behind by a player who
> had left the game. "What is that?"
a remnant of bad information/advice apparently?
> another
> player asked, pointing at the cup. I was folded,
> and, much to my surprise, I found myself coming
> out of my folded reverie with "detritus vadentis"
> as a spontaneous response.
>
I don't understand that?
Ace0f_5pades
aparently an extremely obselete remnant...
I suppose it's made known now...
and not with effort of discovery -but why should you do anyway
different?
I didn't stand and wait my youth, and I wouldn't impose it... but
whats an alien to do?
Id ask for your number, if you'd give it.
...
The so called higher ways do still exist, but this lot seriously make
me question it all.
But one things still for sure, I wanna play texas holdem.
I'll find my companion.
jsqu...@gmail.com
> No—but a most burlesque barbarous experiment.
> When was a harsher sound ever heard, ye Muses, in England?
> When did a frog coarser croak upon our Helicon?
> Hexameters no worse than daring Germany gave us,
> Barbarous experiment, barbarous hexameters.
> -- Tennyson
>
> Boito does pretty well in Italian, though. (Note: the passage below is
> as actually sung in his opera, "Mefistofele". Some of the lines are
> chopped, compared to the printed libretto. I have a copy of the original
> somewhere.)
>
> ELENA [ assorta in una fatale visione ]
> Notte cupa, truce,
> Senza fine, funebre!
> Orrida notte d'Illio!
> Implacato rimorso!
> Nugoli d'arsa
> Polvere al vento
> Surgono e fanno
>
> CORETIDI
> Pace!
>
> ELENA
> Di cozzantisi scudi
> E di carri scroscianti
> E di catapulte sonanti
> Sì muta il suol
> In volutabro di sangue.
>
> CORETIDI
> Numi! Numi!
>
> ELENA
> I numi terribili
> L'ire inferocendo
> Della pugna;
> L'ispide torri
> Ergonsi tragiche, negre,
> Fra la caligin densa.
>
> CORETIDI
> Elena!
>
> ELENA
> Veggonsi l'ombre degli Achei
> Proiette bui profili giganti
> Vagolar le pareti
> In mezzo ai roghi.
> Alto silenzio
> Regna poscia
> Dove fu Troia.
>
> --
> John W. Kennedy
> "The blind rulers of Logres
> Nourished the land on a fallacy of rational virtue."
> -- Charles Williams. "Taliessin through Logres: Prelude"
You are far beyond me with regard to the various
meters used by poetry in different languages. That
being said, however, I still find your observations
interesting. In particular, your
"...I don't know of any
> modern language wherein dactylic hexameters seem good. I've seen a
> couple of attempts in English, but very unsatisfying.
> It's a phenomenon that I've not seen adequately explained.
..."
sets me to much speculation. I think that we will find
the explanation partly in the ongoing dramatic developments
in understanding the mechanics of the brain. For example,
would the alpha rhythm have trouble lining up with
dactylic English?
Ed Cryer
<jsqu...@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:4df2b5c0-e37c-490b...@21g2000yqj.googlegroups.com...
> When was a harsher sound ever heard, ye Muses, in England?
> When did a frog coarser croak upon our Helicon?
> Hexameters no worse than daring Germany gave us,
> Barbarous experiment, barbarous hexameters.
> -- Tennyson
>
> Boito does pretty well in Italian, though. (Note: the passage below is
> as actually sung in his opera, "Mefistofele". Some of the lines are
> chopped, compared to the printed libretto. I have a copy of the
> original
> somewhere.)
>
> ELENA [ assorta in una fatale visione ]
> Notte cupa, truce,
> Senza fine, funebre!
> Orrida notte d'Illio!
> Implacato rimorso!
> Nugoli d'arsa
> Polvere al vento
> Surgono e fanno
>
> CORETIDI
> Pace!
>
> ELENA
> Di cozzantisi scudi
> E di carri scroscianti
> E di catapulte sonanti
> S� muta il suol
> In volutabro di sangue.
>
> CORETIDI
> Numi! Numi!
>
> ELENA
> I numi terribili
> L'ire inferocendo
> Della pugna;
> L'ispide torri
> Ergonsi tragiche, negre,
> Fra la caligin densa.
>
> CORETIDI
> Elena!
>
> ELENA
> Veggonsi l'ombre degli Achei
> Proiette bui profili giganti
> Vagolar le pareti
> In mezzo ai roghi.
> Alto silenzio
> Regna poscia
> Dove fu Troia.
>
> --
> John W. Kennedy
> "The blind rulers of Logres
> Nourished the land on a fallacy of rational virtue."
> -- Charles Williams. "Taliessin through Logres: Prelude"
You are far beyond me with regard to the various
meters used by poetry in different languages. That
being said, however, I still find your observations
interesting. In particular, your
"...I don't know of any
> modern language wherein dactylic hexameters seem good. I've seen a
> couple of attempts in English, but very unsatisfying.
> It's a phenomenon that I've not seen adequately explained.
..."
sets me to much speculation. I think that we will find
the explanation partly in the ongoing dramatic developments
in understanding the mechanics of the brain. For example,
would the alpha rhythm have trouble lining up with
dactylic English?
**************
Maybe John can tell us better, but the commonest theory I come across is
"Oh, it's due to the highly inflected nature of Latin. The dactylic
rhythms are native to spoken Latin in the classical age".
I've acquired some skill with Latin hexameters, but it didn't come
easily. It came from falling in love with Vergil's poetry at an early
age. And I'm at the stage where I can switch into it instantaneously.
Something similar used to occur when I travelled in France; spoke French
close to fluently.
But take the examples that John's given above. I wouldn't have looked
for hexameters unless I'd been told they were there. And even then I
have trouble with them.
Ed
John W Kennedy
> Maybe John can tell us better, but the commonest theory I come across is
> "Oh, it's due to the highly inflected nature of Latin. The dactylic
> rhythms are native to spoken Latin in the classical age".
I don't see what inflection has to do with it; it's simply that, in
Latin and Greek, some syllables are genuinely shorter than other
syllables. In some cases, syllable length distinguishes between two
words -- more so, however, in the case of Greek; Latin use of dactylic
hexameter was very likely conceived in imitation of Greek. French, at
the other extreme, is pretty much ta-ta-ta-ta-ta-ta-ta-ta-ta-ta, and
consequently relies largely on syllable counting. English has less
difference in syllable length than Latin or Greek, but more than French;
compare "Thurston threatened Clement's breakfast plans" to "itty bitty
kitty committee". But it has not been normally used in formal verse
schemes since the Old English period. (The old alliterative verse
involves regular syllable-length patterns.) First-rate poets, however,
still use syllable length as an expressive tool. The classic example is
Pope's:
When Ajax strives some rock's vast weight to throw,
The line too labors, and the words move slow;
Not so, when swift Camilla scours the plain,
Flies o'er the unbending corn, and skims along the main.
(That last line goes by so fast that most people don't even notice that
it's an Alexandrine rather than a pentameter.)
--
John W. Kennedy
"I want everybody to be smart. As smart as they can be. A world of
ignorant people is too dangerous to live in."
-- Garson Kanin. "Born Yesterday"
jsqu...@gmail.com
Those lines from Pope are very nice. He is one of my
favorites. As to knowing Alexandrine from pentameter
I am completely at sea and it embarrasses me. I can
hear the difference between good poetry and bad, but
I have no idea how I do it. ....sort of a variation of that
famous saying by the supreme court judge speaking of
pornography:
"I don't know what good poetry is, but I know it
when I hear it."
Maybe as I inch into some Vergil, I can also try to
pick up some more understanding about what you have
said so well in your email.
Thanks
Will Parsons
> On 12/28/09 8:51 AM, Ed Cryer wrote:
>> Maybe John can tell us better, but the commonest theory I come across is
>> "Oh, it's due to the highly inflected nature of Latin. The dactylic
>> rhythms are native to spoken Latin in the classical age".
>
> I don't see what inflection has to do with it; it's simply that, in
> Latin and Greek, some syllables are genuinely shorter than other
> syllables. In some cases, syllable length distinguishes between two
> words -- more so, however, in the case of Greek; Latin use of dactylic
> hexameter was very likely conceived in imitation of Greek.
I don't have any quarrel with the view that Greek and Latin (at least
partially under the influence of Greek) based poetry on the the alternation
of of heavy and light syllables, but I wonder whether the distinction
between heavy and light syllables is one of length. It is true that under
certain circumstances two light syllables can take the place of a single
heavey syllable, and it is generally accepted that a long vowel was held
out for approximately twice the length of a short vowel, but consider the
first syllables of the following words:
catena
captus
campus
The first vowel in _catena_ is short, and the syllable would count as
metrically light. In pronouncing the [kam] of campus, I can readily
believe that the resonant [m] is metrically equivalent to a vowel, and that
the syllable takes approximately twice as long to pronounce as the [ka] in
_catena_. But does the [kap] of _captus_? Because the [p] is momentary in
duration, it seems to me to take only marginally longer to pronounce [kap]
than [ka]. So, the sense of heaviness of the first syllable of _captus_ vs
_catena_ would seem to arise out of the complex consonant cluster [pt] vs
[t].
Similar considerations would apply even more so to Greek, where the name
"Neoptolemos" would be syllabified [ne-o-pto-le-mos]. Here, the second
vowel is short, but the syllable is heavy by virtue of the following [pt]
cluster.
--
Will
Ed Cryer
"John W Kennedy" <jwk...@attglobal.net> wrote in message
news:4b3975e6$0$31274$607e...@cv.net...
I noticed that increase from 10 to 12 beats in the line straight away.
How else could Pope have produced the desired effect using iambs?
Not so with the great Augustan Latin poets. The dactylic hexameter was
sufficient in itself to do all the work.
Spondees and dactyls. Vergil and Horace could work wonders with them.
Ajax and Camilla, from the Aeneid;
acerrimus Aiax
et gemini Atridae Dolopumque exercitus omnis:
aduersi rupto ceu quondam turbine uenti
(dada, dada, da//da, dada, dadidi dada)
Camilla
agmen agens equitum et florentis aere cateruas,
(dadidi, dadidi, da//da, dada, dadidi, dada)
Ed
John W Kennedy
> John W Kennedy wrote:
>> On 12/28/09 8:51 AM, Ed Cryer wrote:
>>> Maybe John can tell us better, but the commonest theory I come across is
>>> "Oh, it's due to the highly inflected nature of Latin. The dactylic
>>> rhythms are native to spoken Latin in the classical age".
>>
>> I don't see what inflection has to do with it; it's simply that, in
>> Latin and Greek, some syllables are genuinely shorter than other
>> syllables. In some cases, syllable length distinguishes between two
>> words -- more so, however, in the case of Greek; Latin use of dactylic
>> hexameter was very likely conceived in imitation of Greek.
>
> I don't have any quarrel with the view that Greek and Latin (at least
> partially under the influence of Greek) based poetry on the the alternation
> of of heavy and light syllables, but I wonder whether the distinction
> between heavy and light syllables is one of length.
It has been accepted as such for as long as people have been analyzing
classical Greek and Latin verse -- or the most skillful Greek and Latin
prose, for that matter -- going back to when Homer still had an oral
performance tradition.
--
John W. Kennedy
"Though a Rothschild you may be
In your own capacity,
As a Company you've come to utter sorrow--
But the Liquidators say,
'Never mind--you needn't pay,'
So you start another company to-morrow!"
-- Sir William S. Gilbert. "Utopia Limited"