Cicero is, in fact, one of the most important figures in our tradition: statesman and orator, rhetorical theorist, public philosopher, and a writer of marvelous letters that still give us a candid picture of insider politics that is unmatched to this day.
Habemus Oratorum Domum? Can Paul Ryan win the support of the House Freedom Caucus, the Republican Study Committee, and the Tuesday Group? If he can, forget the speakership, let’s talk sainthood, because unifying House Republicans counts as his first miracle. E. Christian Kopff sent me this gem, written by one Jim Geraghty from the NR website. I don’t read National Review in any form, print, internet, or the original crayon, so I don’t know who Mr. Geraghty is or if he has a whimsical turn of mind or if he is possibly fond of ridiculing the ignorance of learned languages...
PC Do you believe the neoconservative dominance of mainstream discourse of US foreign policy is slowly coming to an end or we simply seeing a generational shift? Also, have the neoconservatives in your judgement played a role in instigating the current crisis in Ukraine? TJF The neoconservatives in themselves are of little or no importance. They do not formuulate policy, they merely repeat the slogans of the Cold War Democratic Party and put a slight conservative spin. Their great success was in making an alliance with American Evangelical Zionists, who have been taught to see the world...
Thomas Fleming was interviewed in August by Mike Krupa of Polonia Christiana. For readers of Polish, the inteveiw is available here. For those less fortunate, we have posted the original exchange in English., PC After almost 8 years of Barack Obama’s presidency, what kind of country is the United States? TJF When Barack Obama was elected President, reaction was divided along party lines. Democrats, especially those who belonged to ethnic minorities, expected rapid improvement in their condition and in their opportunities for advancement. They also expected a quick end to the military adventurism that had characterized his predecessor’s administrations. Republicans, by contrast, feared...
Governor Kasich has finally got himself into the news. Falling asleep in the debate did not work.so now he turns to that last refuge of corrupt Republican: religion. Accused of pandering for votes by supporting socialized medicine, he offers to give his critics free copies of the Bible. Looks like this is one more cause of a good Catholic boy who has followed the papacy into non-revolutionary socialism. This is one we cannot blame on Pope Francis or Paul VI or even on Leo XIII. Kasich abandoned the Catholic Church for materialist hedonism, and when he found he needed some...
In this first draft of the Roman section, I am only going to list a few indispensable works with a few suggestions on translations. As the weeks and months go by, I’ll be updating this and other sections that are posted.
Good grammar is said to be all the rage on dating sites. This story would be good news, had it been reported anywhere but in the Wall Street Journal, whose columnists and editors do not appear to know the difference between grammar and spelling. They lead the story with a young man who was put off by a potential date who wrote him a confirmation of their first meeting: “I’ll see you their.” Poor Mr. Cohen—a chump more interested in spelling than romance. The young lady has made a fortunate escape. One is almost tempted to agree with the Columbia University...
Part One: The Greeks Pre-Classical Homer The Iliad and the Odyssey There are many translations and imitations. For plain prose by good scholars, there is Lang, Leaf, and Myers for the Iliad and Butcher and Lang for the Odyssey. George Chapman’s translations and Alexander Pope’s Iliad are important works of English verse. T.E. Lawrence’s Odyssey is a readable narrative. Iliad I: Iliad II There are several Autodidact essays and podcasts on Homer, e.g. https://fleming.foundation/2022/01/the-autodidact-homer/ and https://fleming.foundation/2016/12/boethius-book-club-episode-10-the-odyssey/. You can find many others simply by searching “Homer.” Many are free podcasts, and other, more polished lectures, are for sale. The Homeric...
Jocaste once again reassures Oedipus that religion is bunk. Even if the servant changes his story about the number of Laius’s killers, “he will never prove that the killing of Laius was as predicted, namely that he would be killed by my son as Apollo prophesied.” Thus the second witness is not crucial to the story. Oedipus here also makes an important slip: It is not just oracle-mongers who are not to be trusted, but the god himself.
Oedipus issues an edict against the killer and the blind seer Teiresias is brought in to assist the case and, as members of the audience might suppose, to reprise his role in the Antigone. It is Teireisias’ fortune, though (unlike Cassandra) not his destiny, to speak plain truth to unbelieving ears.
