H&Q 12 Greek to English

[bingley]

I'm having trouble with this sentence from the Greek to English exercise.

[size=200] δίδαξαι τὸν ἀδελφὸν γε τὴν γραπικήν. ἄνευ γὰρ ταύτης τῆς τέχνης οὐ/τε γράφεται ποτε καλὰ βιβλία ὑπ’ ἀνδρῶν τῶν γραφέων καλουμένων οὐ/τε καλῶς ἀκούουσιν οὗτοι ὑπό γε τῶν σοφῶν. [/size]

Tentatively, I translate it as:
Teach your brother writing. For without that skill, no good books are ever written by the men called writers nor are they spoken well of by the wise.

But this doesn't really make sense. Shouldn't it be:
For without that skill, no good books would ever be written by the men called writers nor would they be spoken well of by the wise.

In which case, shouldn't the Greek be:

[size=200] δίδαξαι τὸν ἀδελφὸν γε τὴν γραπικήν. ἄνευ γὰρ ταύτης τῆς τέχνης οὐ/τε ἂν ἐγράφετο ποτε καλὰ βιβλία ὑπ’ ἀνδρῶν τῶν γραφέων καλουμένων οὐ/τε ἂν καλῶς ἤκουον οὗτοι ὑπό γε τῶν σοφῶν. [/size]

[adz000]

I'm not sure I see why the simple past indicative and present indicative don't make sense, since the sentences makes sense as a factual statement.

No books were ever written without writing; men do not have good reputations among without writing.

I think your sentences is just as good, but has a slightly different meaning.

As a followup question for the σοφώτεροι: could one interpret this statement as a suppressed future less vivid construction, and so use "an" with the optative?

[If there should be no wisdom], no good books would be written, etc.

[Skylax]

Here is a sentence by "Antisthenes" (Cynicus? quoted by Stobaeus) of the same kind :

[size=134]οὔτε συμπόσιον χωρὶς ὁμιλίας οὔτε πλοῦτος χωρὶς ἀρετῆς ἡδονὴν ἔχει.[/size]

Neither a drinking-party without company nor wealth without virtue do involve pleasure.

About the meaning, I think that :

- In the original form, it says that at least there is no pleasing wealth without virtue and it does NOT say whether wealth can ever involve pleasure at all.

- With ἄν and the imperfect, it would imply "but, indeed, there ARE cases where wealth involves pleasure because it IS sometimes at least put together with virtue."

- With ἄν and the optative, we have a mere possibility, an sheer intellectual hypothesis : "assume that wealth could be separated from virtue, then it could involve no pleasure." This expression would still be valid even if wealth and virtue were PERMANENTLY conjuncted.

[bingley]

I'm not sure I see why the simple past indicative and present indicative don't make sense, since the sentences makes sense as a factual statement.

No books were ever written without writing; men do not have good reputations among without writing.

I think your sentences is just as good, but has a slightly different meaning.

But it isn't past, it's present: [size=150]γράφεται [/size] (books) are written .....

I suppose I'll just have to put it down to H&Q's fondness for bizarre sentences, but I still think it should be a contrafactual since in fact books are written.

[Emma_85]

For without that skill neither are good books ever written by men called writers nor do they hear themselves named by the wise in a good way./(do they stand in the high esteem of the wise.)
I don't think he's saying 'if they didn't have that skill... then', he's saying that those without that skill are rubbish. So that there are men who call themselves writers, but who don't have the skill and so are never heard of again really.