Latin: An Intensive Course by Floyd L. Moreland and Rita M. Fleischer (review)

BOOK REVI EWS / COMPTES-RENDUS LATIN: AN INTENSIVE COURSE by Floyd L. Moreland and Rita M. Fleischer. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1977. Pp. xvi, 459. Paper, $10.95. Teachers seeking appealing imaginativeness will not find it here; those more concerned with no-nonsense thoroughness will not be disappointed. The whole nature of Latin: An Intensive Course (hereafter LAIC) rests on its origin at the famous blitz summer programs in Berkeley and New York, in which mature, sometimes newly graduated, students of demonstrably high intelligence and motivation were to acquire a reading knowledge of Latin as rapidly and completely as possible. On this timetable (a), all linguistic basics are covered in one month, with the specific intention that there follow six weeks of intensive reading of ancient and mediaeval texts to strengthen the hothouse seedling. How many of us have any students, even one, capable of such rapid acquisition, possessed of the necessary elephantine memory, linguistic talent, concentration and motivation? True, the authors claim, and fairly, that LAIC can also be used in less intensive courses (b) [e.g. in a summer course over 6-8 weeks?] or in regular programs (c). At this slowest pace (c), we must then ask what there is to recommend this course over Wheelock or a number of grammars circulating in Ontario schools for years. Certainly there is unlikely to be much new in a book half of whose sources antedate 1910. Reference to Woodcock's 1959 A New Latin Syntax suggests recognition of recent modifications in our understanding of language, but many social and pedagogical changes have also occurred since 1900, of which little account seems to be taken here. The authors' highly traditional approach is sincere and very well worked out. Most teachers, of whatever philosophy, will agree that at some stage students must become capable of literal translation, and that sooner or later paradigms must be perfectly memorized. But the authors' decision to introduce the subjunctive and certain involved constructions at any early stage to facilitate the reading of unal tered texts is not trail-blazing; J. T. Allen did the equivalent with the Greek subjective and optative in his 1917 First Year of Greek. The authors would undoubtedly make the Roman reply that change where needless is pointless, and that they have adopted what has proven best regardless of its period and of changing fashion. My greatest criticism of the text is that it utterly lacks humor. Perhaps that is Roman too, but let us recall Juvenal' s complaints about the boredom of contemporary classrooms, and furthermore that we are not teaching Roman youngsters . For all its undoubted faults, the Carribridge Latin Course has set a standard of sprightly humor and consistent characterization quite unmatched by any course before or since. The following LAIC sentences for translation, while specially selected to make my readers wince, augur ill: Regina in insula non erat sed erit. (31) Saxis pugnaveramus ne nautae acerbi feminas poetarum clarorum spectarent. (57) The king's very healthy brother feels that the constellations are brighter than the fires in the streets of this city. (160) Are we never to escape these tired queens and sailors' wives? The book culminates in connected reading passages from-you guessed it-Caesar' s GaUic War BOOK REVIEWS / COMPTES-RENDUS 75 (300-307). Rare would be the teacher who felt such fare capable of stimulating the high-school appetite of the 1970's and 1980's, however beautifully prepared would be those few students who chose to study Latin further at university. It would perhaps be less unrealistic to imagine unversity students as tolerating so much aridity in the interest of a greater good. For let us be fair. Once we have recognized the limited scope of readers to whom it would appeal, the books has many excellent features. The English, if dry, is delightfully pure and cl ear, a fine model to students of how a thorough knowledge of Latin can benefit one's self-expression in one's own tongue. The book is also extremely systematic in its presentation of syntax, morphology and vocabulary, together with countless useful exercises on new points or for review . Indeed, in its provision of exercises...