kundalini's log

Continue or start your personal language log here, including logs for challenge participants
kundalini
Orange Belt
Posts: 106
Joined: Sun Jan 24, 2021 8:17 pm
Languages: English (C), Greek (low intermediate)
x 335

kundalini's log

Postby kundalini » Sat Apr 24, 2021 5:55 am

Hi all,

I thought I'd start a log to keep track of my progress in language learning. At the moment, I'm studying Korean, French, and Ancient Greek, mostly on a casual basis. This log, for now, will largely focus on my effort to read the Iliad in Greek. I've had several abortive attempts to read it before, so chances are pretty high that I won't finish it this time, either! But I am more committed this time around, and assuming that I'll get to the end, it will probably take me the better part of a year to do so.

Part of my fascination with the Iliad has to do with the subject matter. Then there is the music of the Iliad. I came across this recitation some years ago and have been enchanted ever since.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s9RgBj59d9k

The resources I'm using to go through the Iliad are the following:

Audio: http://hypotactic.com/my-reading-of-hom ... -progress/
Some years ago, I purchased a recording of the Iliad by Stephen Daitz, but I can't locate it, and moreover prefer this free version read by David Chamberlain.

Text: https://www.amazon.com/Iliad-Parsed-Int ... 01K3L9CWM/
Interlinear text that parses every word and also translates each line into English, though not always accurately.
After going through a section, I also re-read it in a copy of Loeb's bilingual edition.

I just completed the first book, which took some three weeks and about 200 flashcards, and am currently on line 35 of book 2. I'm still haunted by this line:

βῆ δ' ἀκέων παρὰ θῖνα πολυφλοίσβοιο θαλάσσης

FINISHED PROJECTS:

SQL Pocket Guide: 315 / 315
Last edited by kundalini on Fri Apr 07, 2023 4:08 am, edited 1 time in total.
6 x
Iliad: 12 / 24

User avatar
MorkTheFiddle
Black Belt - 2nd Dan
Posts: 2113
Joined: Sat Jul 18, 2015 8:59 pm
Location: North Texas USA
Languages: English (N). Read (only) French and Spanish. Studying Ancient Greek. Studying a bit of Latin. Once studied Old Norse. Dabbled in Catalan, Provençal and Italian.
Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... 11#p133911
x 4823

Re: kundalini's log

Postby MorkTheFiddle » Sat Apr 24, 2021 5:46 pm

kundalini wrote:I just completed the first book, which took some three weeks and about 200 flashcards, and am currently on line 35 of book 2. I'm still haunted by this line:

βῆ δ' ἀκέων παρὰ θῖνα πολυφλοίσβοιο θαλάσσης

Hello, Kundalini,
Welcome to the forum.
The rhythm of Greek epic meter and Homer's skill with poetic figures of speech, including as here onomatopoeia and alliteration, give an added pleasure to reading Homer.
You have made a good beginning, and I wish you continued pleasure and success.
0 x
Many things which are false are transmitted from book to book, and gain credit in the world. -- attributed to Samuel Johnson

kundalini
Orange Belt
Posts: 106
Joined: Sun Jan 24, 2021 8:17 pm
Languages: English (C), Greek (low intermediate)
x 335

Re: kundalini's log

Postby kundalini » Sun Apr 25, 2021 2:22 am

MorkTheFiddle wrote:Hello, Kundalini,
Welcome to the forum.
The rhythm of Greek epic meter and Homer's skill with poetic figures of speech, including as here onomatopoeia and alliteration, give an added pleasure to reading Homer.
You have made a good beginning, and I wish you continued pleasure and success.


Thanks for the warm welcome and kind words!
1 x
Iliad: 12 / 24

kundalini
Orange Belt
Posts: 106
Joined: Sun Jan 24, 2021 8:17 pm
Languages: English (C), Greek (low intermediate)
x 335

Re: kundalini's log

Postby kundalini » Wed Apr 28, 2021 10:21 pm

Now I'm at about halfway through book 2, at line 395 specifically, which means that I've read 1,000 lines of the Iliad -- only 14,000 more to go! Going through book 1 was pretty tough, but reading the Iliad feels easier now, and I'm sure it will continue to become easier. I wonder if I'll be able to read it unaided by the end. I've stopped making flashcards for the time being, preferring to reinforce vocabulary by pushing ahead and encountering them in different contexts. I may do a sweep at some point to pick up words that I didn't retain, including hapax legomena.

Some highlights--

Laughed out loud at the over-the-top description of Thersites:

αἴσχιστος δὲ ἀνὴρ ὑπὸ Ἴλιον ἦλθε
φολκὸς ἔην, χωλὸς δ' ἕτερον πόδα: τὼ δέ οἱ ὤμω
κυρτὼ ἐπὶ στῆθος συνοχωκότε: αὐτὰρ ὕπερθε
φοξὸς ἔην κεφαλήν, ψεδνὴ δ' ἐπενήνοθε λάχνη

An arresting description of a prophetic scene:

ἔνθ᾽ ἐφάνη μέγα σῆμα: δράκων ἐπὶ νῶτα δαφοινὸς
σμερδαλέος, τόν ῥ᾽ αὐτὸς Ὀλύμπιος ἧκε φόως δέ,
βωμοῦ ὑπαΐξας πρός ῥα πλατάνιστον ὄρουσεν.
ἔνθα δ᾽ ἔσαν στρουθοῖο νεοσσοί, νήπια τέκνα,
ὄζῳ ἐπ᾽ ἀκροτάτῳ πετάλοις ὑποπεπτηῶτες
ὀκτώ, ἀτὰρ μήτηρ ἐνάτη ἦν ἣ τέκε τέκνα:
ἔνθ᾽ ὅ γε τοὺς ἐλεεινὰ κατήσθιε τετριγῶτας:
μήτηρ δ᾽ ἀμφεποτᾶτο ὀδυρομένη φίλα τέκνα:
τὴν δ᾽ ἐλελιξάμενος πτέρυγος λάβεν ἀμφιαχυῖαν.

I don't know whether the Iliad is worth the hundreds of hours I've put into Greek and hundreds more that I will continue to pour into it, but it's certainly very entertaining.
4 x
Iliad: 12 / 24

kundalini
Orange Belt
Posts: 106
Joined: Sun Jan 24, 2021 8:17 pm
Languages: English (C), Greek (low intermediate)
x 335

Re: kundalini's log

Postby kundalini » Sun May 16, 2021 2:24 am

I finished the rest of book 2 of the Iliad, which was brutal. Line after line of extended imageries, in which every other word was unfamiliar, followed by hundreds of more lines cataloguing who from where had how many ships.
3 x
Iliad: 12 / 24

User avatar
Xenops
Brown Belt
Posts: 1444
Joined: Mon Nov 30, 2015 10:33 pm
Location: Boston
Languages: English (N), Danish (A2), Japanese (rusty), Nansha (constructing)
On break: Japanese (approx. N4), Norwegian (A2)
Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... 15&t=16797
x 3559
Contact:

Re: kundalini's log

Postby Xenops » Sun May 16, 2021 3:45 am

kundalini wrote:I don't know whether the Iliad is worth the hundreds of hours I've put into Greek and hundreds more that I will continue to pour into it, but it's certainly very entertaining.


If it's entertaining, isn't that reason enough? :D Educational to boot (in a good way)!
0 x
Check out my comic at: https://atannan.com/

kundalini
Orange Belt
Posts: 106
Joined: Sun Jan 24, 2021 8:17 pm
Languages: English (C), Greek (low intermediate)
x 335

Re: kundalini's log

Postby kundalini » Sun May 16, 2021 9:31 pm

Xenops wrote:If it's entertaining, isn't that reason enough? :D Educational to boot (in a good way)!


Good question! I don't know that I have a good answer, but as I'm now firmly entrenched in my middle age, I find myself thinking more and more about how best to spend my remaining time. I suppose the power of great art lies not only in its ability to entertain, but also in its capacity to touch deepest parts of ourselves and to transform us in the process. With many professional and familial commitments in my life, entertainment value alone may not be quite enough to have me dedicate many hours to a project, but the possibility of a deeply resonating purpose might tip the scale.

I was largely drawn to the Iliad by its theme, and hope to read the Odyssey afterwards for the same. It seemed to me that the Iliad had something to say about anger, a raw protective instinct that acts to ensure our survival, but if misdirected, can lead to wholesale destruction. Then there is the homecoming of the Odyssey, a long peril-laden journey toward the place where one truly belongs, where one becomes whole again. These are questions I've perhaps struggled with all my life in some way, and in my middle age, they've become more prominent and more explicit. And I suspect that the power these epics had over the ancient Greeks and others who followed afterwards is related in some part to their engagement with these important questions.

So this is a roundabout way of saying that I approach these stories with a secret hope that they will help me negotiate the difficulties of life, and become a better person in the process. I had some doubts on the ability of art to do this; it seemed to me at best limited. But I watched a TV show recently (called My Mister) that did, in fact, touch the deepest emotional chords and leave me palpably transformed! Without being didactic, it had a deeply felt moral purpose, the kind I read about once in college in an essay by John Gardner. And it only took 20 hours of my life to watch it.

In comparison, the time investment I've put into Homer already far exceeds that amount, and I expect the payoff to be less. So why keep reading the Iliad? I'm not sure, except that I don't know if there are other similarly powerful TV shows equally worthy of my time as the one I watched, and additionally, having started the Iliad, I'd like to finish it.
6 x
Iliad: 12 / 24

User avatar
MorkTheFiddle
Black Belt - 2nd Dan
Posts: 2113
Joined: Sat Jul 18, 2015 8:59 pm
Location: North Texas USA
Languages: English (N). Read (only) French and Spanish. Studying Ancient Greek. Studying a bit of Latin. Once studied Old Norse. Dabbled in Catalan, Provençal and Italian.
Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... 11#p133911
x 4823

Re: kundalini's log

Postby MorkTheFiddle » Mon May 17, 2021 5:58 pm

kundalini wrote:
In comparison, the time investment I've put into Homer already far exceeds that amount, and I expect the payoff to be less. So why keep reading the Iliad? I'm not sure, except that I don't know if there are other similarly powerful TV shows equally worthy of my time as the one I watched, and additionally, having started the Iliad, I'd like to finish it.
You seem set on finishing the whole Iliad, but if your determination flags somewhere along the way, way back when (1903) Allen Rogers Benner compiled sizeable Selections from Homer's Iliad. I assume the paperback includes Benner's notes along the way and the Vocabulary and Greek Index in the back. There's a chance your local library has it. I have used Benner's book and recommend it.
Pamela Draper did something similar for The Odyssey, but I am not personally familiar with her work.
As to the tone of your post, they say "youth is wasted on the young," and it is equally true, I think. that good literature is wasted on the young. What good are life lessons if you haven't had a life yet? Personally I have witnessed a brilliant young subordinate walk away from a stodgy (and dense) boss, to the definite detriment of the company and of those of us who depended on the expertise and assistance of the subordinate. He was, like Achilles, practically irreplaceable.
Enough. I am sure you get my drift.
Continue to enjoy Homer!
4 x
Many things which are false are transmitted from book to book, and gain credit in the world. -- attributed to Samuel Johnson

kundalini
Orange Belt
Posts: 106
Joined: Sun Jan 24, 2021 8:17 pm
Languages: English (C), Greek (low intermediate)
x 335

Re: kundalini's log

Postby kundalini » Tue May 18, 2021 10:47 pm

Thank you for the book recommendation. I'll certainly keep it in mind if reading the entirety of the Iliad becomes unrealistic. I'm aiming for an average of 30 lines a day, which doesn't sound like much, but my Latin classes as an undergrad required about 50 lines of reading per night on average.

MorkTheFiddle wrote:As to the tone of your post, they say "youth is wasted on the young," and it is equally true, I think. that good literature is wasted on the young. What good are life lessons if you haven't had a life yet? Personally I have witnessed a brilliant young subordinate walk away from a stodgy (and dense) boss, to the definite detriment of the company and of those of us who depended on the expertise and assistance of the subordinate. He was, like Achilles, practically irreplaceable.
Enough. I am sure you get my drift.
Continue to enjoy Homer!


Haha, or perhaps wisdom is wasted on the old!
5 x
Iliad: 12 / 24

kundalini
Orange Belt
Posts: 106
Joined: Sun Jan 24, 2021 8:17 pm
Languages: English (C), Greek (low intermediate)
x 335

Re: kundalini's log

Postby kundalini » Tue Apr 12, 2022 8:22 pm

After a long break, I've resumed reading the Iliad. I took a few weeks to re-read books 1 and 2, and have just finished reading book 3. Book 2 was nearly as painful this time around as the last, with so many unknown words. But I'm putting in more effort to retain the vocabulary, as I've begun keeping a notebook of new and forgotten words. It seems to be paying off, and I feel that I'm perhaps not too far off from reaching a critical mass of Homeric vocabulary. Hopefully I can start reading more naturally, relying less on translation and commentaries. I can sometimes fly through a dozen lines without much help, but might, in the next line, be bogged down by five unknown words. It feels good to be back at it.
5 x
Iliad: 12 / 24


Return to “Language logs”

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 2 guests