-
. The POTIS Project
I. Curculio: An Online Journal
II. My Other Sites and Pages
III. My Old Texts
IV. Favorite Sites
V. Blogroll
VI. Other Links
Recent Comments
- Jeremias Grau on Five More Seneca Commentaries
- BAMBOS NEOPHYTOU on Callimachus on Heraclitus
- Raphael Soares on Artemis a Model for Widows?
- Raphael Soares on Artemis a Model for Widows?
- Leonardo de Arrizabalaga y Prado on “Government by Clowns”?
Author Archives: Michael Hendry
An Unlikely Source
Facts about the ancient world, even when mentioned in ancient texts, are not always found in the texts we would think of consulting first, or second, or at all. In his commentary on Martial I, Peter Howell refers (205) to … Continue reading
Little-Known Fact: BBC Shakespeares
Amazon and other retailers offer four BBC Shakespeare DVD box sets, of five plays each: Comedies, Histories, Tragedies, and Tragedies II. The list price is $149.99 per box, and Amazon doesn’t discount them nearly as much as most of their … Continue reading
Posted in Culture: Plays, Movies, Nachleben
1 Comment
Overheard while Waiting to Take the PRAXIS Latin Test
Dramatic dialogue recounted by a man who teaches in a small town in the country (T = teacher, S = student): T. What’s 60 divided by 15? S. Four. T. What’s 15 divided by 60? S. We can’t do that, … Continue reading
Fielding Translates Silius
Silius Italicus doesn’t have much of a Nachleben, but here’s a translation of Punica 2.217-221 from The Complete Works of Henry Fielding, Esq., edited by James P. Browne (London, 1903), Volume XI, page 155: A Simile from Silius Italicus Aut … Continue reading
Posted in General, Latin Literature, Nachleben
Leave a comment
Dubious Historical Claim of the Day
InstaPundit links to a story from the Knoxville News about Tina, a Shire breed horse claimed to be the world’s tallest. The dubious historical claim is half a sentence: “Shires date to the Trojan War . . . .” What … Continue reading
More Wilkie Collins
Some quotations from The Guilty River (1886): 1. The hero’s stepmother describes their Member of Parliament, who has been unlucky in love (VI): “. . . quite broken-hearted about Lady Lena; gone away to America to shoot bears.” 2. The … Continue reading
Posted in Culture: Fiction
Leave a comment
Latin or Pseudo-Latin?
Colby Cosh writes: “I guess I’m the only news editor alive who isn’t busy reading about horcruxes.” I haven’t read the books or seen the movies, and have no plans to do either, but shouldn’t that be ‘horcruces’?
Posted in Orbilius
Leave a comment
One Reason I Prefer the Classics
The theory taught in graduate schools of modern literature is like mortadella: it’s expensive, imported, beautifully packaged, made with loving care by experts who have devoted their lives to their work and do it very well . . . but … Continue reading
Posted in - Aphorisms
1 Comment
Beyond Bibliophilia
She herself was a victim of that lust for books which rages in the breast like a demon, and which cannot be stilled save by the frequent and plentiful acquisition of books. This passion is more common, and more powerful, … Continue reading
Riddle
Why would ‘Noel’ be the most appropriate name for a priest’s pet parakeet?
Posted in General, Jokes
Leave a comment
The Value of a First-Class Education
What one British rogue learned at school in the early 19th century: . . . I was sent to one of the most fashionable and famous of the great public schools. I will not mention it by name, because I … Continue reading
Posted in Culture: Fiction, General
Leave a comment
Signs
I’ve been in Staunton, Virginia, for some Shakespeare at the Blackfriars Playhouse — more on that later. For now, I’ll just post about some interesting signs seen along the way: Sign that looks like it’s missing a letter: Grim Realty. … Continue reading
Posted in General
Leave a comment
Ponderings of a Fictional Fop
Ambrose Silk, September 1939: It is a curious thing, he thought, that every creed promises a paradise which will be absolutely uninhabitable for anyone of civilized taste. Nanny told me of a Heaven that was full of angels playing harps; … Continue reading
Posted in Culture: Fiction, General
2 Comments
Two Things I Didn’t Know
My school has a ‘service day’ every semester, when students are sent out to do good works of various kinds. Tomorrow, high-schoolers over 16 will be demolishing a house for Habitat for Humanity, while those under 16 (HforH has an … Continue reading
Posted in Teaching
Leave a comment
Cruel, But Not Unusual
Many of my students — especially a couple of 7th-grade boys — show a great deal of interest in ancient forms of capital punishment. Today I put together a model to illustrate the Athenian practice of apotumpanismós, or ‘planking’, which … Continue reading
About the Author
If InstaPundit can post a portrait of himself drawn by a two-year-old nephew, I suppose I can post a portrait of me done by the youngest of my sixth-grade Geography and Latin students: I like the way it gives the … Continue reading
Posted in General, Work: Teaching
2 Comments
Food for Thought
One of the great ironies of the Internet age is that traditional ephemera, such as newspaper articles and diary entries, now live on forever in indexes and blogs. Meanwhile, given the short shelf life of modern books — basically, six … Continue reading
Posted in General
Leave a comment
Emendations ‘R’ Us
Eve Tushnet has a top-ten post on horror in pop songs. Unfortunately, I’ve never heard of any of the songs, and only one of the performers – Siouxsie and the Banshies – who was (were?) the object of a Beavis … Continue reading
Posted in Music, Work: Editing
1 Comment
Musical Snark
Charles Rosen, The Classical Style, p. 170: It was Handel who said that Gluck ‘knows no more counterpoint than my cook’ . . . Tovey has pointed out that Handel’s cook, who was also a singer in Handel’s opera company, … Continue reading
Posted in Music
Leave a comment
Seneca Commentaries
I’ve updated the list of twentieth-century commentaries and other works on Seneca’s Epistulae Morales (link on the left) with four or five recent works. It’s a busy field, though there are still three dozen letters in which the reader is … Continue reading →