ANCIENT GREEK ALIVE

by Paula Saffire and Catherine Freis

273 pages

University of North Carolina Press 1999
www.uncpress.unc.edu

"What a delight! At last we have a way to spark the enthusiasm of beginners and lead them into a serious study of Greek. This high-spirited, good-humored text was far more effective at drawing students out and getting them into morphology and syntax than any I have used in 35 years of teaching! . . . This is the most creative text I have ever seen."

"Saffire has produced an introductory Greek text that is more than a text. It is an excitement, an enticement to learning. Her energy and enthusiasm come through to the student and the teacher and must sweep them along."

Caveat:

"It does require flexible instructors, energetic scholars willing to transmit their knowledge in a way markedly different from the way they themselves acquired it."

SO:

If you are that flexible, energetic teacher, read on!

DESCRIPTION OF ANCIENT GREEK ALIVE

FAN MAIL & A FEW OTHER HUZZAS

WORDS TO STUDENTS

STEPS AND STAGES

DESCRIPTION (for teachers)

Ancient Greek Alive is a combination of the NEW and the OLD. It is wildly innovative and traditional almost to the point of being schoolmarmish.

"Ancient Greek Alive is an innovative approach to learning Greek. . . . At the same time, the content is as rigorous and linguistically sophisticated as any traditionalist could ask for."

These are some distinguishing features:

CONVERSATIONAL ANCIENT GREEK

STORIES FROM OTHER CULTURES IN EASY ANCIENT GREEK

CLEAR GRAMMATICAL EXPLANATIONS WITH BITE-SIZED EXERCISES, AMBIGUITY ALERTS, A BIT OF LINTGUISTICS, AND POINTERS ON THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE

SYSTEMATIC BUILD-UP OF THE GREEK VERB SYSTEM WITH SPECIAL ATTENTION TO ASPECT VERSUS TENSE

TRANSLATIONESE AND PARSING

CUMULATIVE VOCABULARY REVIEWS AND GRAMMAR REVIEWS

SHORT POEMS FOR MEMORIZATION AND THESAUROS OF SHORT PASSAGES IN ORIGINAL GREEK

LIVELY ESSAYS ON SELECTED ASPECTS OF GREEK CULTURE

PARADIGM SECTION AND A HIGHLY USABLE INDEX

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CONVERSATIONAL ANCIENT GREEK

Who would have thought that you could speak ancient Greek in the classroom! Well, you can. It is not hard--scripts are provided--and for most students, it is the most enjoyable, least intimidating introduction to ancient Greek they could possibly have.

Yes, it takes courage. But it lasts only nine classes. And those nine classes provide a foundation for a year of Greek. There is an appendix on how to embroider a script. You will improve year after year. And you will find student enthusiasm and learning ample reward for your efforts.

Students absorb a tremendous amount of grammar without even knowing it. Also, they learn to pronounce Greek fearlessly, which improves reading out loud.

p. 3: Sample script - Note: Vowels are uncontracted. Contraction will be taught soon afterwards.
(Acrobat pdf file - not huge, but please be patient - it will be worth it!)

To hear sample script #1 (p.1)
(MP3 file - requires an appropriate player - many players should work!)

To hear sample script #3 (p.3)
(MP3 file - requires an appropriate player)

STUDENT COMMENTS:
(Note: Most student comments are anonymous, from end-of-course evaluations.)

"Everything I learned by speaking I remember."

"I love the oral beginning of the course."

"I'm so excited. Speaking was a really good idea. I have so much confidence."

"It's a wonderful technique, to learn so much in the first two weeks and then spend the rest of the time discovering all the things you already sort-of know. It was very scary. . . but it was worth it in the end. It made everything that was to come later seem less threatening and less overwhelming."

"It's comforting to see that nothing will sneak up on you. When approaching a new chapter you can honestly say that you've seen the material, even if only in one word."

"The part of the textbook which helped me the most was the scripts -- learning the sound before the letters made it easier to read on sight."

"Compared to my friends who have learned Greek from another book, I am so comfortable about reading aloud."

TEACHER COMMENT:

"The act of speaking Greek cements many grammatical concepts in the minds of the students before they learn them formally."

"The first nine lessons are cleverly crafted dialogues between instructor and students and betwen the students themselves, dialogues with humor and subtlety that engage the participants immediately and have them, all unawares, memorizing material (enclitics, subjunctives) they will later systemtically intellectualize, when it will seem pleasantly familiar."

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STORIES FROM OTHER CULTURES IN EASY ANCIENT GREEK

These stories are not watered down versions of ancient Greek stories, nor are they boring. They appeal to adults and children. In fact, some of the tales may even be enlightening.

Illustration of "Looking for the Ring" by Marti Faist (not in textbook)

I chose what was especially amusing or interesting from books I was reading out loud to my children (in the early 1970's). The Nasrudin stories are everybody's favorite. Imagine my surprise, years after writing the book, when I heard a meditation teacher from India telling these very Nasrudin stories! This is how I learned that Nasrudin is a Sufi teaching figure.

Students stay with the tales not just to learn Greek but to find out how they end! Eliot Youman told me that one student would laugh out loud in class over the stories. In my class students have groaned when the bell rang and then stayed after to finish a story. Two of my students married and now tell stories from Ancient Greek Alive to their children.

p. 38: Sample story ("Looking for the Ring")
(Acrobat .pdf file)

To hear the story "The Doctor Comes" (p.17-18)
(MP3 file - requires appropriate player.)

To hear the story "Never Enough" - Part 2 (p.135)
(MP3 file - requires appropriate player.)

To hear a section of the story "The Gift of Gold" - Part 2 (p.181)
(MP3 file - requires appropriate player.)

TEACHER COMMENTS:

"Saffire's text has wonderful, witty stories of various origins . . . all in good classical Greek. These stories can be read swiftly by students of even average ability."

"The [stories] are full of humor and intelligence."

"[The Nasrudin tales] provide humor and continuity as they instruct. . . . A wonderful example of this is found on p. 57. Here, Nasrudin is asked which is more useful, the sun or the moon. The dialogue offers several opportunities to use comparison."

"Reid [age seven] comes to Greek class with a cat-that-swallowed-the-canary grin when his homework was to complete a story. He can't wait to repeat the translation for me."

STUDENT COMMENT:

"I started Greek with another book. I was surprised to discover how much more intrigued I was by the readings in AGA. In my previous book, I translated just to do with homework and without real interest. Here I find myself eager to see how the story turns out."

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CLEAR GRAMMATICAL EXPLANATIONS WITH BITE-SIZED EXERCISES, AMBIGUITY ALERTS, A BIT OF LINGUISTICS, AND POINTERS ON THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE

p.30: O-Group Nouns, with exercises and a bit of linguistics
(Acrobat .pdf file)

p. 68: Third Group Nouns, with a bit of linguistics
(Acrobat .pdf file)

p. 82: Participles, with Ambiguity Alert
(Acrobat .pdf file)

p. 133: Contrary-to-Fact Conditions, with remarks on English
(Acrobat .pdf file)

TEACHER COMMENTS:

"I admire the clarity of the morphological presentation, which manages to slip in a little linguistics in a painless manner, and the force and simplicity of the syntactical explanations. Even the layout of the page has an immediately understandable logic."

"Concepts are introduced at the right time and in the right way."

"The lessons in Saffire's book present new material in small enough bites to facilitate comprehension with a reasonable amount of effort and within a reasonable amount of time."

"Apart from teaching Greek, it [AGA] teaches students to examine their own language. It disassembles both languages in a way which is perceptive and stimulating."

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SYSTEMATIC BUILD-UP OF THE GREEK VERB SYSTEM WITH SPECIAL ATTENTION TO ASPECT VERSUS TENSE

There is a relentless attention paid to aspect throughout the book. Most important is the basic presentation. Subtleties are included to set the seed for later reading of sophisticated Greek.

Henry Phillips of Chase and Phillips was kind enough to tell me, way back in the early '70's, that he preferred my presentation of aspect to his.

p.108: Verb Overview: Aspect and Tense
(Acrobat .pdf file)

p. 125: Sample information box, with remarks on aspect and the English language (Acrobat .pdf file)

p. 130: The 99% Principle, a subtlety of Greek
(Acrobat .pdf file)

p. 154: The Perfect, with schema of the active voice and remarks on aspect vs. tense
(Acrobat .pdf file)

p 200: Schematic review of the entire Greek verb
(Acrobat .pdf file)

STUDENT COMMENTS:

"I love the way that the Greek verb is presented so clearly and with so much review. I 'got' the idea of the verb rather than just doing rote memory, as I had done in my first semester of Greek using a different book. I never really understood tense and aspect until I worked with this book."

"Saffire presents key elements of the language in a tabular form, which makes it very easy to pick out crucial elements of the language that require particular attention."

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TRANSLATIONESE AND PARSING

Translationese is an artificial language which enables students to telegraph their recognition of Greek forms. Rather than being hampered by this demand for precision, students enjoy it.

Parsing is a "no-place-to-hide" activity. You cannot fuzz over gaps in your grasp of grammar. There are occasional parsing assignments in the book and also a caveat against going overboard:

p. 66: Remarks on translationese
(Acrobat .pdf file)

p. 76: Remarks on parsing
(Acrobat .pdf file)

STUDENT COMMENTS:

"I like the strict accuracy in translation. We are able to see the actual Greek translation rather than making it sound elegant in English."

"Parsing being presented early was really helpful. We were able to learn how to parse simpler sentences and get the hang of it. It made it easier once we got to verbs."

"Parsing is very helpful in increasing accuracy in translating. The emphasis on strict accuracy has helped me in my understanding of Greek language construction. It has also increased my appreciation for the intricacy and subtlety of meaning possible in the Greek language."

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CUMULATIVE VOCABULARY REVIEWS AND GRAMMAR REVIEWS

The action is arrested. We stop to learn vocabulary and nothing else. This underlines the importance of vocabulary. There are cumulative grammar reviews as well. As I tell students, "If someone told you (s)he knew English but just didn't know what most words mean, you'd have your doubts."

p. 25: Vocabulary review (of words learned through speaking)
(Acrobat .pdf file)

p. 171: Review of translationese for all verb forms
(Acrobat .pdf file)

STUDENT COMMENT:

"The review chapters are wonderful!"

TEACHER COMMENT:

"When I saw pages devoted to vocabulary review, I wanted to throw my hat in the air and cheer!"

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SHORT POEMS FOR MEMORIZATION AND THESAUROS OF SHORT PASSAGES IN ORIGINAL GREEK

Poems can deliver a lot of information in a small, intriguing space. Early on (p. 11) we start with a short poem. Only by Lesson #27 (p. 117), when the contract aorist infinitive is learned, do we reach the point of being able to understand the grammar of this poem fully.

The Thesauros or "Treasure House" section of the book contains copious short passages of original Greek. Almost every chapter has some reading from the Thesauros for inspiration and a change of pace. There are stimulating selections from the New Testament, Heraclitus, Xenophanes, Diogenes, various sayings by the famous and not-so-famous, and a group of lively Greek epitaphs and thoughts about death.

There are indications within the chapter on selections to be read. The readings have been gathered in a separate section for flexibility in timing. This also allows students eventually to read all of the related selections together.

p. 11: Anacreontic poem as introduced in Greek conversation
(Acrobat .pdf file)

p. 117: Final comments on the same Anacreontic poem
(Acrobat .pdf file)

p. 168: Review of poems, with the new one by Archilochus in a box
(Acrobat .pdf file)

p. 232: Thesauros sample (Famous Sayings, or Sayings of the Famous)
(Acrobat .pdf file)

STUDENT COMMENTS ON POEMS:

"My friends in the modern languages, when asked to speak the language they are studying, they dialogue about restaurants or hotels. But I just love being able to outshine them by reciting Sappho or Anacreon."

"I'll remember some of these for the rest of my life. They helped with vocabulary usages, connection to culture--all of these."

STUDENT COMMENTS ON THESAUROS:

"I love the glimpse into real life that reading the epitaphs gives me."

"The readings make ancient Greek 'more alive.' They provide insight into the thinking of philosophers and give glimpses of daily life."

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LIVELY ESSAYS ON SELECTED ASPECTS OF GREEK CULTURE

These short essays by Catherine Freis present a series of openings to engage students with some important ideas and to draw them into further Greek studies. Some themes are Greek medicine, lyric poetry, pre-Socratic philosophers, a comparison of Nasrudin and Socrates, and Greek turtle tales.

p. 132: Sample Essay on Diogenes the Cynic (who appears in the Thesauros)
(Acrobat .pdf file)

STUDENT COMMENT:

"I always look forward to reading the essays. They give me a break from mastering forms and vocabulary and help me to think about the significance of what I am learning."

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PARADIGM SECTION AND A HIGHLY USABLE INDEX

The Paradigm section speaks for itself.

Here is a sample Index page. You can see how much attention is paid to the English language.

p. 264: Sample index page
(Acrobat .pdf file)

"[I] continue to use the book as a valuable reference this semester in conjunction with my follow-up textbook. I have found not infrequently that it is easier to locate material that I want to review in AGA."

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FAN MAIL AND A FEW OTHER HUZZAS

Dear Paula and Catherine:

This is a fan letter for Ancient Greek Alive.

Last semester, suffering through another frustrating semester of 1st year Greek with another textbook that relies solely on reading with almost no grammar. . . I pulled my exam copy of your text off the shelf, read a grammatical explanation that seemed remarkably clear, and started photocopying. I found that, especially after I'd gone over a couple of pages with my students, I couldn't stop photocopying, so I wound up blowing up the course and shifting gears radically. I then ordered the text for this term.

My students love how clear the lessons are. You treat them like intelligent adults, while still allowing them to have fun with the stories. I'm finding your grammar and vocabulary reviews very cleverly embedded in the reading (just as I would do it).

Finding this text and finding that it works has been a huge relief. I look forward to starting with the text from day one in the fall.

Dear Ms Saffire,

I am what I have learned from my studies to identify as an opsimath.

At the age of sixty I began to do something which has enriched my life in so many ways. I bought Peter Jones little book Learn Ancient Greek. Then went on to Athenaze, and halfway through that to the JACT Reading Greek, which I made my way through from end to end (with a two months' diversion going through Clyde Pharr's wonderful old-fashioned and severe but loveable Homeric Greek). . . .

What I wanted to say to you is that I only recently became aware of your Ancient Greek Alive, and I bought it partly because I am fascinated by all language teaching books but also as a revision course. I have to say, and I am sure you have had it said to you thousands of times, it is a masterpiece in so many ways. Apart from teaching Greek, it teaches students to examine their own language. It disassembles both languages in a way which is perceptive and stimulating. Even though it is the last of my textbooks, it has enriched my life and made many things which lurked in a mist brilliantly clear. Thank you so much.

Letter to the publisher:

I recently purchased a copy of Ancient Greek Alive. After having begun to review and study from it, I can honestly say that it is the best ancient Greek book on the market. The print is large enough to be seen (a great help for reading pitch marks and rough breathing marks), the stories are very interesting, and the oral Greek lessons provided at the beginning of the book are superb in getting students into Greek from Day One. Most of all, the explanations are readily undertandable." (The writer asks whether there will be a tape, an answer key, and a workbook.)

Reid Barton began to study Greek with me privately in Janaury , 1991. We tried many approaches. He was eager to learn although at that time he was only 6 1/2 years old and, most significant, he had had no formal training in English grammar or any other grammar. His unusual intelligence combined with both a purely traditional approach and a learning-from-context approach succeeded only so far. Until we switched to your book, he could memorize paradigms but he couldn't really read Greek. As soon as we began using your book, "gulping" sometimes two scripts in one session, something remarkable happened! One day, everything clicked. From then on, we started to learn diagramming sentences--the old fashioned way. Suddenly Reid could deal with sentences of any length and of any complexity. Your book really makes sense to him. Without your book, he couldn't understand how cases work. . . .

"A good venture for any young-at-heart teacher who is disenchanted with traditional texts which leave students cold."

"This book sparkles. The students find themselves reading Greek before they are aware of what is happening."

"I love using AGA. It is thorough and subtle. And it allows classes to be fun."

"There is no possible way that I would have lasted three semesters of Greek without this book being my first introduction."

"The presentation is charming, engaging the students in a way that allows them to work through the grammar thoroughly without the sense of mind-numbing drudgery that seems to attend so many introductory language courses."

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WORDS TO STUDENTS

If you want to learn from this book without a teacher, you MUST find someone who knows Greek to take you through the first two weeks. If you already know enough Greek to navigate the scripts by yourself, it will be fine as a primary learning tool or a second-year review.

p.xv: Words to Students (Everything I said in my introduction still holds true.)
(Acrobat .pdf file)

STUDENT COMMENT ON INTRODUCTION:

"Reading the introduction alone is inspiring, where Saffire speaks of how much she really does love Greek and classical studies. I am beginning to share in that love."

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OK, we're going down the memory trail.

(1) I learn Greek at Mount Holyoke College from the most brilliant woman I have ever known, Jean Pearson Schoales. When I think of that mind correcting my tedious sentences ("They bring the stones to the road"), I shudder and I marvel.

(2) I get my Ph.D. at Harvard. Bravo for Harvard! The reading list is inspiring: read all of Aeschylus, all of Sophocles, seven by Euripides, all of Homer, etc. etc. And special gratitude for having been forced to take two composition courses in ancient Greek. Without them I could never have written AGA!

(3) I have a son and go to Jones Library in Amherst Massachusetts to find books to read aloud to him. Why I was reading Nasrudin tales to a two-year old I'll never know! But I guess it stretched his brain. And the tales wound up in this book. Surely these are the only Sufi stories in ancient Greek!

(4) I get a job teaching Ancient Greek at the University of Massachusetts. I discover that the pain I was willing to endure as a student, I was not willing to inflict as a teacher. And so I wrote a more inviting textbook than any I had seen.

(5) Beginning Ancient Greek by Paula Reiner. Pretty tame title! (This is from a blurb about the early version. There was no cover.)

The first incarnation of AGA, used by me in the early 1970's at the University of Massachusetts. Already I was using conversational ancient Greek. And I used stories from other cultures rewritten in easy ancient Greek.

(6) Ancient Greek Alive by Paula Reiner.

The second incarnation of AGA. By 1992, I was teaching at Butler University in Indianapolis. Eliot Youman of Mercer University and Joel Farber of Franklin & Marshall, two brave souls were using my textbook. (Coincidentally, they were in the same Yale Ph.D. vintage.) I decided it was worth publishing the book. What title to use? I consulted with a group of women in my Jungian mandala group: Beginning Ancient Greek or Ancient Greek Alive? They practically hooted me out of the room for even considering the former. It is so good to have friends with high vitality!

A certain publisher was going to publish AGA. The day before the manuscript was due, I was told that a reviewer had slammed it, even questioning whether I, the author, was a native speaker of the English language. The reviewer had also said that with Athenaze around, no other textbook was needed. Imagine my shock when, at a Classics meeting, this reviewer introduced himself as someone producing software for Athenaze. (Does ancient Greek literature teach us to be ethical?) I decided to self-publish AGA. At the last minute Aldine Press published it for me.

Aldine Press delivered all the copies to me (though that was not our agreement). Their thought was that I "wouldn't mind" doing the distribution for them. ( I loathe distributing.) I eventually bought back my rights. I am so glad I did. In the end I found the right co-author, Catherine Freis, and the right publisher, University of North Carolina Press.

(7) Ancient Greek Alive by Paula Saffire and Catherine Freis, the final incarnation.

My classics name was Paula Reiner. But my legal name was Shakti Reiner. (I had changed it when the name Shakti, Energy, was given to me by my meditation teacher from India.)

Eventually I took a pen name, Paula Saffire, from a vision of a sapphire ring and published a novel under that name. One day it dawned on me that the two elements of my legal name had been given to me by my ex-guru and my ex-husband. I decided to take my pen name legally. So much for the first author of Ancient Greek Alive. As for the co-author, Catherine Freis:

I gave a talk on using conversational ancient Greek at an APA meeting in 1992. Catherine was in the audience. She was so taken with my description that she told the bookstore at Millsaps College to send back the textbooks she had ordered for her Greek course and to do a rush order on Ancient Greek Alive. She used the textbook and loved it. When term was over, she phoned me and said she could add exercises and stories, which would make the book more usable. Thus began a cordial and fruitful collaboration.

This is Catherine and myself working on AGA! We took a trip to Crete together to get our heads in synch and had someone photograph us on the beach for tax purposes. It was a pleasure being able to discuss every little detail. Probably the most thorny question to arise was whether to use "should" for the subjunctive in translationese. We decided that "should" was the least of all evils.

It was grueling work producing the textbook because I was not only author but "typesetter." It was photocopied from the printouts of my computer. I spent endless amounts of time deciding on placement, reducing and enlarging spaces. At one point during summer I was putting in ten-to-twelve-hour days on the book, many in a row. I felt like a soldier. Life was so stripped down. I had no idea you could spend less than five minutes a day thinking about food and still survive. There was a kind of elation to living at the edge. I was a scholar-warrior.

The book is out, and I am pleased with it. There are still errata, although I tried my hardest to eliminate them. But there is nothing about the book I would change right now if I were given the chance. It is as I envisioned.

It remains only to hope that YOU, whoever you are, will try it and like it
-- and also that you will give me helpful feedback.

Paula Saffire
Butler University, Classics Department
4600 Sunset Avenue, Indianapolis, IN 46208
Office: 317-940-9864 Home: 317-257-0537

http://blue.butler.edu/~psaffire

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