Salvete amice! I originally started to post this as a response to an already active topic but decided to create a new thread instead.
In the past week I’ve been doing quite a bit of “themed” writing in latin on various topics: Description of a traditional U.S.A. thanksgiving dinner (Hodie dies festa est apud nos); a recipe for cheese sauce for your nachos ( de jure ex caeseo facto); another recipe for making a tasty, herby, garlicky batch of potatoes (Facite farraginem sapidam ex batatis et herbis); a description of my emotional state as the stock market goes up and down (modo pectus ovat ut hodie); a query regarding latin pronunciation (quomodo nobis est dicendum verbum CUI ?); etc. These “themed writings” were all in the form of letters posted at the Grex Latine Loquentium listserve. In addition to these letters I responded/reacted in latin to several other themes, such as one on the Bhagavad Gita that included original translation of that sanskrit work into latin verse (: De scientia suprema. Bhagavadgita, III, 10 - 14); another on the modern latin poetry of some academic in the Vatican (Mario Pisani). In all I wrote over 23 letters in 7 days and I guess I am sort of bragging. Not that they were error free, far from it. My point however is that themed writings are an excellent way to develop vocabulary, learn about sentence structure and get a better grasp of grammar because you are forced to face what you don’t know. Seeing how other participants are handling their composition is also invaluable. The Grex Latine Loquentium is open to all; writings may be on any topic; participants at all levels are welcome. The only rule of the GREX is that everything be written in latin without exception! We at the Grex, I think this is the consensus, would like to see more participation from others. To anyone interested writing journals, jokes, news summaries, musings, stories or any other kind of “themed writings” I commend the Grex Latine Loquentium to you. Use google to find instructions on how to subscribe. The archives of Grex are a treasure house of modern latin prose and verse composition. I would love to see some cross pollination between the groups.
My point however is that themed writings are an excellent way to develop vocabulary, learn about sentence structure and get a better grasp of grammar because you are forced to face what you don’t know.
I wholeheartedly agree with that. Since I started writing to my blog in Latin (short posts only), I’ve learned not only some vocabulary necessary to complete the post, but also about participles and gerunds (…and a tiny bit about gerundives. I’m still not getting the concept) in Latin. When I use new vocabulary, which is almost always, I have a Nova Verba section at the end of the post, which lists and defines all the new words I had to learn to make the post. As for the grammar, the post itself helps to reinforce the new grammar concepts I learn. I find that this method of learning grammar and vocabulary is much more fun than going through just Wheelock’s. Now, I’m not using Wheelock’s as intensely (I’m only doing three or four exercises as opposed to all or half of them, as I used to do), and I use my blog to practice the new grammar I’ve learned, instead. Once I get good enough, I’ll probably also do some Latin to English translations, but I’m not there yet. I see my blog now as a supplement to my studies in Latin.
I was going to say something else, but I forgot (Watch this post for edits?).
Wow! That’s interesting. You are a latin blogger. Is it a public blog that we can check out? Last time I visited EPHEMERIS, the latin language internet news outlet, I noticed that that site was linking to a number of latin bloggers.
I’m only on Chapter 11 of Wheelock’s, so the stuff I’m writing about right now is pretty basic (I’ve written a four-sentence summary on the FSM’s version of the Earth’s creation and translated Dragostea Din Tei, but that’s about as advanced as I’ve gotten. Everything else probably isn’t worth reading: just me whining about how much I’m procrastinating). My Latin posts are nowhere near as long as those of the latin blogs linked from Ephemeris.
There’s my warning — there’s nothing impressive. The link to my blog is under all of my posts (www). It’s a livejournal.
Back to the original topic: I would join Grex, but I can’t even read the rules.
Edit: Just to clarify what I meant by the www link: Y’know, that bunch of buttons beneath everyone’s posts? Mine are: profile, pm, and www . That www .
In case you’re too lazy to just look at my blog, here it is reproduced:
Chorus 1: x4
M?i?-hī
M?i?-hū
M?i?-ho
M?i?-haha
Chorus 2
Salvē, salvē, ego sum proscriptus.
Am?b? tē, amor meus, gaudium accipē.
Salvē, salvē, sum Picasso,
Sonum tibi dabam, et valē?.
Mē nē poscere ulli a tē scī.
Chorus 3: x2
Abīre cupis, sed mē non adsumis,
Mē non adsumis,
Amor in philyr? et
Vultus tuus ocul?rum
tu?rum mē monē?.
Chorus 4:
Voc? tē dē me? sententi?.
Salvē, amor meus. Ego sum gaudium.
Salvē, salvē, ego rursus sum, Picasso,
Sonum tibi dabam, et valē?.
Mē non poscere ulli a tē scī.
Chorus 3, Chorus 1, Chorus 3
Now that I look at it again, I think “Picasso” should be “Picassus” instead…
Edit: If you want to try singing it, I put dots to show where the words would be in the original, romanian version: http://www.43things.com/entries/view/2521353 Two consecutive dots means lengthen the vowel so it covers two syllables…
