Greek Comp, Steingarten

[annis]

Right now I'm reading It Must've Been Something I Ate by Jeffrey Steingarten. He's a food essayist. I just read this wonderful little paragraph, and this seems like a challenge without being insurmountable:

The great Brillat-Savarin declared, "We can learn to be cooks, but we must be born knowing how to roast." I often lie awake nights worrying about whether I was born to roast. It can be total agony.

I'll post my own attempt in a few days.

[chad]

hi will, i tried this:

[face=SPIonic]o9 me/gaj a)nh\r e1fh,[/face] "[face=SPIonic]to\ pe/ssein me\n didakto/n, e1mfutoj de\ h( to\ o0pta~n te/xnh[/face]". [face=SPIonic]polla/kij a)grupne/w qauma&zwn ei0 tau/thn th\n te/xnhn e1xw: w(j odunhro/j, oi1moi[/face]

the great (man) said, "cooking can be taught, but the skill of roasting is inborn". often i lie awake wondering if i have this skill: how agonising, oimoi.

i put cooking and roasting in as infinitives with the neuter article, because i think they're used as verbal nouns there.

i'm interested in seeing how you'll put it

cheers, chad.

[annis]

I have taken liberties. I aimed to get the sense more than the exact wording, since I can barely imitate Steingarten's style in English, much less Greek.

[face=spionic]o( me/gaj Briiat-Sabarin e)/fh,[/face] "[face=spionic]manqa/nein me\n oi(=oi/ t' e)sme\n gi/gnesqai ma/geiroi, moi=ra d' h(ma=j fu=nai e)pistame/nouj o)pta=n.[/face]" [face=spionic]polla/kij a)/upnoj kei=mai e)n th=| kli/nh| fronti/zwn po/teron moi=ra/ moi o)pta=n h)\ ou)xi/. e)ni/ote/ m' a)nia=|.[/face]

[annis]

i'm interested in seeing how you'll put it

With a preference for poetic vocabulary, as usual. I chose [face=spionic]a)/upnoj[/face] to your [face=spionic]a)grupne/w[/face] (did you intend to Ionicize or did you forget to contract?).

Also, should it not be [face=spionic]h( tou~ o0pta~n te/xnh[/face]? I don't see the articular infinitive much in poetry.

[annis]

Hmm.

Chad, I think I like your "how agonizing" better than approach, now that I've thought about it a bit.

[chad]

hi will, excellent, i learned a lot of new words reading your translation, thanks

you're right, i didn't contract [face=SPIonic]a)grupne/w[/face]...

with "the roasting skill", i read in Lampas that the particular thing in which you're skilled takes the accusative after [face=SPIonic]te/xnh[/face], so i put the verbal noun in the acc. i wasn't quite sure whether you could use the article + infinitive like that, but i gave it a go

just some questions about your translation for my own benefit:

should [face=SPIonic]e0pistame/nouj[/face] be in the infinitive? i was reading the lsj definition of [face=SPIonic]fu=nai[/face] and it looked (at a quick glance) like you follow [face=SPIonic]fu=nai[/face] with the inf., so "to be formed/disposed by nature to know to roast"?

and is [face=SPIonic]a!upnoj[/face] (adjective) used as an adverb here?

the first bit on your quote sounds really nice, is that a common idiom?: "we are such as to learn to become"...? did you get that from a particular author?

thanks, chad.

[annis]

hi will, excellent, i learned a lot of new words reading your translation, thanks

Excellent! And it only took me a week to produce.

should [face=SPIonic]e0pistame/nouj[/face] be in the infinitive? i was reading the lsj definition of [face=SPIonic]fu=nai[/face] and it looked (at a quick glance) like you follow [face=SPIonic]fu=nai[/face] with the inf., so "to be formed/disposed by nature to know to roast"?

I was trying to emphasize the sense of "to be born knowing..." so I had the participle, argreeing with [face=spionic]h(ma=j[/face]. But the infinitive construction might be better.

and is [face=SPIonic]a!upnoj[/face] (adjective) used as an adverb here?

I'd say not. It's agreeing with the subject of [face=SPIonic]kei=mai[/face], namely "I."

the first bit on your quote sounds really nice, is that a common idiom?: "we are such as to learn to become"...? did you get that from a particular author?

I think this is one of the standard ways in Attic to express ability. Smyth has several references (the index points them all out). Section III of the LSJ article for [face=SPIonic]oi(=oj[/face] gives a bunch of interesting examples, too. This idiom sticks in my mind because it isn't used in Epic, yet it retains the generalizing sense of [face=SPIonic]te[/face] that Attic otherwise lost.