
Latin Lover - diodorus
http://www.newcriterion.com/articles.cfm/Latin-lover-8611
======
hprotagonist
I am routinely startled and pleased every time I remember that Catuullus was
responsible both for one of the most gutting elegies I know of (101) which
ends with the well known phrase

    
    
        And forever, brother, hail and farewell 
    
    

.. was _also_ the guy who wrote the angriest and most explicit rebuttal to a
critique of his style -- so rude, in fact, that it wasn't printed in
translation in english until the middle of the 20th century, because the
opening lines are:

    
    
        I will sodomize you and face-fuck you,
        bottom Aurelius and catamite Furius,
    

Which even in this article is alluded to, but not actually printed.

[0]:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catullus_101](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catullus_101)
[1]:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catullus_16](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catullus_16)

~~~
dyim
#16 is my personal favorite [1] - but #85 is a close second:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catullus_85](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catullus_85)

[1] It reminds me of the spoken-word intro to "Love Sosa" :)

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pselbert
Latin was required as part of my program in high school, some 20+ years ago
now. It wasn't until tonight that I remembered we weren't supposed to read
Catullus. Some of the more adventurous guys (all boys school) would make
reference to his poems and our highly conservative teacher would have a fit.

------
pmontra
My class studied Catullo and those poems at school some 30 years ago in Italy.
I had no idea that there was no English translation yet. Nice to know there is
now. Basically they are the only fun poems we studied in the whole Latin
literature course. Maybe the Somnium Scipionis too, but for other reasons.

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lwhalen
I had an incredible Latin teacher in high school. Regrettably, he never
mentioned Catuullus (or perhaps that was saved for the Latin IV and V
students...)

------
Khaine
I would like to learn Latin. Does anyone know any good free online resources?

~~~
barry-cotter
First use Duolingo to learn Italian. Then start buying copies of books from
the Loeb Classical Library and read the Latin and English text. Then read the
Latin, noting the words you can't recognise and study them. Then read the
Latin again. Once you can read one book buy another one. You will not learn to
write Latin this way but you will end up able to read it.

Or you could try these. I vouch for none of the below free websites. The time
investment needed to learn a language is insane and textbooks are cheap,
especially secondhand.

[http://www.learnalanguage.com/learn-
latin/](http://www.learnalanguage.com/learn-latin/)

[https://www.lingq.com/learn-latin-online/](https://www.lingq.com/learn-latin-
online/)

[http://surfacelanguages.com/language/Latin](http://surfacelanguages.com/language/Latin)

