Re: Perfective or Perfect?

On 20/03/2008, R A Brown <ray@...> wrote:
>
> Tackling Vergil after only nine months of self-teaching - I'm impressed!
>
I must admit it is a little presumptuous of me, since, as you have
seen, I made thus many mistakes. I blame Gavin Betts for introducing
the poem in his book. :-P

>
>  OK - I'll just go through the lines - it might be of interest to some
>  others on the list as well. But I'll begin a line earlier (line 471)
>  since that's where the sentence starts:
<snip much useful explanation!>

Thank you for your detailed explanation of the lines! It made not a
few points much clearer, particularly regarding "eo" and "vesper", and
of course what you told me previously about T.E. Page's note on
"defuncta". :-) Mucho gracias! (Was there supposed to be an acute
above the "i"...? Not a Spanish-speaker. Heh.)

>
> Don't be discouraged. Latin verse is not so straightforward as prose. I
>  suggest besides the books you have already, you invest in a good
>  translation of the Georgics with which you can then compare your own
>  translation. Very useful are the books in 'The Loeb Classical Library' -
>  they have the Latin (or Greek) text on one page and the English on the
>  facing page.
>
Ooh I've got the Iliad in that edition, though I haven't started
reading it (or started learning Ancient Greek) and bought it only
because a friend had a half-price discount coupon and I wanted to
start on either Greek or Latin at that point, and so thought a
bilingual text would help immensely. Eventually I picked Latin for the
first course in the meal, but Greek is still equally appetising. :-)

>  But I do agree it is better to try to do the Cl.Arithide directly from
>  the Latin if you can. Translations, especially of verse, can never be
>  100% true; and a translation of a translation invariably loses even more
>  (and not infrequently adds something not in the original).
>
>  I hope the above helps.
>
>
>  --
>
> Ray
>  ==================================
>  http://www.carolandray.plus.com
>  ==================================
>  Frustra fit per plura quod potest
>  fieri per pauciora.
>  [William of Ockham]
>
Thanks once again!

Eugene

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