Re: CHAT High thoughts, anyone? (was: THEORY nouns and cases)

I found it quoted in Oracle documentation - among many
other quotations: there is a quotation at the
beginning of each chapter. For ex, introducing
"Built-in Datatypes" in Oracle Concepts, you can read:
"I am the voice of today, the herald of tomorrow... I
am the leaden army that conquers the world - I am
TYPE." (Frederic William Goudy: The Type Speaks)

I'm afraid I sold my French version of Aristophanes,
Frogs, long ago, but I could try to find it again.

Anyway, "Si non e vero, e bene trovato"...

--- Ray Brown <ray.brown@...> wrote:
> On Thursday, April 29, 2004, at 06:19 AM, Ray Brown
> wrote:
>
> > On Wednesday, April 28, 2004, at 05:33 PM, Mark P.
> Line wrote:
> >
> >> Philippe Caquant said:
> > [snip]
> >>
> >>> "High thoughts must have high language."
> (Aristophanes, Frogs)
> >>
> >> I wonder how Aristophanes proposed to measure the
> height of language.
> >> Much
> >> less the height of thoughts...
> >
> > More to the point: "What did Aristophanes
> _actually_ write?"
>
> Disappointingly no one has answered this. I did a
> Google search today and
> found _plenty_ of examples of people quoting the
> saying and ascribing it
> to Aristophanes' Frogs. Strangely, it seems to be a
> favorite quote in
> computing literature (perhaps as an excuse for using
> jargon in what
> follows).
>
> But no one was more precise about origin. No one
> gave the exact reference
> in The Frogs. I could find no reference to the
> actual Greek words.
>
> What makes me even more suspicious is that all the
> quotes used exactly the
> same words: "High thoughts must have high language".
> In the old days, when
> I taught Latin & Greek, I would've been very
> suspicious if all students
> turned up with precisely the same word for word
> translation.
>
> It seems to me someone listed the quote, attributing
> it Aristophanes'
> Frogs, and everyone else has just copied it without
> further question.
>
> Now, as I assume Mark's question implied, "high" is
> being used
> metaphorically and thus, inevitably, ambiguously -
> certainly out of
> context. I looked up the ancient Greek for "high"
> (hypse:lós) in "Liddell
> & Scott" last evening, hoping that it might give the
> reference.
> Disappointingly, I couldn't find it. But I was
> reminded that applied to
> speech, "high", in ancient Greek, can mean "proud",
> "boastful", "mighty"
> or "sublime". So, Mark, forget the measuring rod  ;)
>
> But are we to understand:
> "Boastful ideas are, by necessity, expressed in
> boastful language"
> "Sublime ideas ought to be expressed in sublime
> language [and not the
> common language of everyday speech]"
> Or what?
>
> Indeed, which of the several different English
> meanings of "must" is to be
> understood here? What is the corresponding verb in
> Greek?
>
> This assumes that the original translation was a
> fairly literal one. But I
> guess it's possible that the adjective rendered
> "high" was not 'hypse:lós'
> , but some other word and that the translator
> thought "high" was the best
> English rendering of the metaphorical use of some
> other adjective.
>
> I suspect that those who have used the quotation -
> and Google reveals that
> many have - do not all have the same English
> interpretation of the words.
> Unfortunately, I do not have such easy access to
> Greek texts as I once had
> & it's a long, long while since I read Aristophanes
> in Greek. I wonder
> what Aristophanes really wrote & what character in
> the play said the words
> & what was the context?
>
> In short: What did the oft quoted sentence actually
> mean?
>
> Ray

=====
Philippe Caquant

"High thoughts must have high language." (Aristophanes, Frogs)


	
		
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