Chris, There is no sin in being a Latin dropout or indeed in never having dropped in on, say, egyptology. Both can be compelling when well taught; and they are of course boring when--as is too often, even usually, the case--they are badly taught. We are long past the time when Ben Jonson could put Shakespeare down for his "small Latin and less Greek".
These things said, a knowledge of the classical languages can also be practically useful and give great pleasure. Expectations are different in different contexts. There is a story about Robert Oppenheimer's response to a complaint from one of his Ph.D. candidates that the paper he had been asked to discuss in a journals seminar was written in Dutch. That response was, "But it's such easy Dutch!" John Gilmore, Ashland, MA 01721 - USA ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, send email to [email protected] with the message: INFO IBM-MAIN
