by adrianus » Sat Aug 11, 2012 3:49 pm
Wheelock himself was unsympathetic to the left-wing politics of most of his colleagues at Brooklyn College (who seem to have liked him all the same, if you can believe what you read) and some of his example sentences were sexist. Wheelock, however, didn't intend his textbook for bourgeois capitalist pigs but for mature students entering U.S. Universities after the Second World War who hadn't done Latin at high-school. A large numbers of GIs were then entering under the 1946 GI Veteran Bill. The book was to serve courses to enable such students to catch up in their first year at Uni. It was also designed to serve the needs of the growing number of correspondence courses and for self learners. If anything, it was meant to be a democratically accessible textbook, even though some example sentences might have made you cringe, if you were a woman or left-wing. At the time (1956), it was indeed a more accessible textbook that most others and well meaning, I think, although you and I may prefer later books as better again.
(
http://www.wheelockslatin.com/classica802--briggsinWP8.pdf)
Maluit Wheelock ipse rerum pristinarum studium non rerum novarum studium quod sodales in collegio brooklyniensi adjuviunt et fuerunt quidem sexismi exempla in tractatu eius, etiamsi admiratus autem ab eisdem sodalibus fuit (si credas quod legis). Non autem classi possessorum avidae expressim destinatus ille tractatus sed discipulis adultis in universitatibus americanis ascriptis post bellum secundum mondiale sine latinitate priùs in gymnasio acceptâ. Tunc magnus fuit nummus militum americanorum ascriptorum sub lege militibus veteranis anni 1946, scilicet anglicè "The GI Bill". Cursibus discendi accelerati servit tractatus, non minùs et cursibus per litterarium commercium (qui eo tempore florebant et studentibus autodidactis. Certum conceptum ut patens ad nummum maximum hoc opus, etiamsi contentae sunt res quae anxiosos faciunt eos progrediendi cupidos femininasve. Anno primi praeconi fuit quidem patentior quam alii tractatus et bene volens, ut opinor, sed non dubito ut et ego et tu noviores et correctiores malimus.I'm writing in Latin hoping for correction, and not because I'm confident in how I express myself. Latinè scribo ut ab omnibus corrigar, non quod confidenter me exprimam.
