Bowing to popular demand, the program in October we are planning will be held in Tuscany. My current thinking is to stay for 3-4 days in Florence and Arezzo, and from those bases we shall visit a few smaller places. Possible destinations include Chiusi, Montepulciano, and Pistoia.
Karl White writes in to ask which translations of Herodotus and Thucydides I recommend. In some ways, I am not the best person to ask, since I do not spend much time reading translations, but I have used a number of translations of the historians for classes.
So begins an epic poem that many readers even today regard as the best work of literature that has ever been written, equalled only by the Odyssey. I never cared for such judgments—the most important theologian, the 3 greatest western movies ever made, the world’s best hotdog. I leave the making of lists to newly wed brides who torture their husbands with “Honey Do lists” they post on the bathroom mirror.
Anyone interested in the study of the ancient Greeks and Romans–the languages, the literature, history, philosophy, etc–may wish to visit the Autodidact on Fleming.Foundation.
I continue to learn the most amazing things on Facebook–generally the things I thought I knew in grammar school and had to spend a lifetime unlearning. Today, someone recirculated a meme with the old wheeze that “idiot” comes from a Greek word meaning private citizen who did not take an interest in public affairs, to which a libertarian–very reliable people, libertarians, one knows what they are going to respond before a question is posed–that the polis was everything.
In a previous light-hearted exercise in “revenge fantasy,” we touched upon the secular/blasphemous misuse of words with strong religious or cultural roots.
In Chapters 5-8, Machiavelli surveys, without a trace of moral indignation, the various ways by which a prince may gain power and, perhaps more importantly, how his long-term success is at least partly conditioned by the means he used to establish his rule.
For example, would we allow people from Third World Islamic nations that hate Christ and despise the West to immigrate, become citizens, vote, and hold office?
I am frequently asked, sometimes more than once a day, what I think of an article in a conservative magazine or some oracular pronouncement from the guru of the moment, whether the guru of the moment be Jordan Peterson or Bernard-Henri Lévy, Greg Mortenson (co-author of Three Cups of Tea) or Tucker Carlson, Bill Maher or Noam Chomsky. When I have something better to do, I dismiss the question by saying I have not read enough of the writer or guru to form an opinion.
In Tuscany, as in ancient Greece, neighborhoods and religious associations played a major part in the organization of everyday life. In Tuscany the church Parishes and the neighborhoods that grew around them, whether known as quartieri (quarters), sesti (sixths), or (in Rome and elsewhere) rioni were the locus of many activities, including the repair of roads and walls.
