Hallo, this is my first post here. When I was in my twenties I learned the Greek alphabet, then later I studied a bit of Greek, but didn’t have the leisure and inclination for deeper study, so I only got a sketchy sort of outline of it. Now I’m retired (though I don’t seem to have as much leisure as I thought I would) I want to study Greek more thoroughly, and I hope with all the internet resources, including Textkit, to get a good enough knowledge to read Greek. I’m using J Taylor’s Greek to GCSE, and will go on to Teach Yourself Greek where I have both the older Smith/Melhuish and newer Betts/Henry books. Do more experienced students consider these a good choice? Or does anyone have suggestions for other books? Thanks for reading this, Epitymbrias
Welcome to Textkit! I’m in sort of a similar situation as a retiree working on my Greek.
Do you have a particular goal as to what you want to read? Homer, Xenophon, the New Testament? The dialects from different eras differ quite a bit.
I can recommend the JACT Reading Greek books as I too have recently started learning Greek and I find this text to be very good. It is focussed on Attic Greek. Are you doing Latin as well or just Greek?
Hi, thanks for your welcome and messages. Ben - I would like to read books that would also interest me in English translation. I’ve found several promising ebooks on Internet Archive including Herodotos, Epicurus, and some of Strabo’s geography. I believe Xenophon is usually viewed as a suitable author for students to work with while gaining fluency, and I have some of his works. I’d probably leave Homer til quite a bit later (though I’ve read and enjoyed both Iliad & Odyssey in Robert Fitzgerald’s versions). Villanelle - Early last year I worked through Teach yourself Beginner’s Latin, so I have some knowledge of it, but I would prefer to concentrate on Greek for the time being. Yes, I’ve seen good reviews of Reading Greek and I might well turn to that if I don’t feel I’m making enough progress with the books I have. Is Athenaze good? I’ve seen mixed reviews for this. John Taylor’s book is really good at explaining things clearly and I’d recommend it for that, but it’s meant for class use so it doesn’t give answers for the exercises unfortunately.
I’ve split this discussion into two. It’s fine to discuss the other bit, but best in the Google-shielded Academy.