Re: VIRGIL: teaching Aeneid in translation

[David Wilson-Okamura]

At 11:48 PM 1/2/2004 EST, Toni wrote:
>>>>
My posture is that as long as better translations are being made available to students who do not have a background in classical latin, then that stokes the fire of curiosity which would then spur those of a more curious nature to either take classes in classical latin or to obtain the latin translation of the narrative and compare the differences of both the Engish and Latin translations.
<<<<


That is what happened to me. I read the Aeneid for the first time in Mandelbaum's translation as part of a three-quarter sequence called Western Civilization. It was my first quarter at Stanford. I was converted instantly, and the next year I started taking Latin so that I could read the poem in the original.

This is probably the exception, I know. The question, I think, is not whether the poem can be taught in translation -- obviously it can. Rather, how does one teach a poem that makes so much of history, when the students who are reading it don't know any history? Going back to something that LHS said earlier in our discussion, it's not just that a knowledge of Roman history enriches our understanding of the poem. The history of Rome, the destiny of its people is what the poem is about.

So, what must I do to be saved? How much do students need to know? Something about JC and Augustus. Something about Antony and Cleopatra, not only for bk. 4 but also for bk. 8 and maybe for bk. 12 as well (if, as I have suggested earlier, the final encounter between Aeneas and Turnus ~ the duel that might have been between Antony and Octavian -- something that was talked about before Actium, but which never came off).

What about the civil wars? On my reading, the fall of Troy (bk. 2) ~ the fall of the Republic and the civil wars leading up to Pompey's headless carcass. The war in Italy (bks. 7-12) ~ the civil war between Antony and Octavian leading up to Actium. But this is speculation -- and maybe that's a sign that it should be left out of a basic introduction.

For bk. 5 (Montaigne's favorite), something might be said about JC's funeral games and JC's comet (the historical prototype for Acestes' flaming arrow). But these things are easier to explain than the fall of the Republic.

The challenge, as I think about it, is to give students a sense, a taste of the poem's richness. What we don't want is for students to leave class with the impression that they can't enjoy Virgil unless they have a master's degree in Roman history.


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David Wilson-Okamura http://virgil.org [EMAIL PROTECTED]
East Carolina University Virgil reception, discussion, documents, &c
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