And another thing
Remember your Latin? Don't all speak at once!
Wednesday, 8th November 2006
An optimist, listing for me the reasons that the deplorable state of the world is not quite as bad as we think, cited, as one of them, ‘the Latin revival’.
An optimist, listing for me the reasons that the deplorable state of the world is not quite as bad as we think, cited, as one of them, ‘the Latin revival’. Oh, is there one? I haven’t heard anyone saying anything in Latin recently, have you? When Fox was asked for advice about quoting in Parliament, he replied, ‘No modern languages except English. No English poet unless dead. Greek never. Latin as much as you like.’ But when did someone last use a Latin quotation in the Commons? I suspect it was Enoch Powell, or possibly Quintin Hogg. I have heard Latin quoted at lunch in the Beefsteak Club (probably by Harold Macmillan) but not for years. I understand it’s not much used in White’s or Brooks’s or even in the Athenaeum. Children used to hold up objects and say ‘Quis?’ Response: ‘Ego!’ Not any more.
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