Commentaries: Greek to Me: Wishing Ancient Greek Were His Mother Tongue

Greek News ^ | November 2006, Posted on Monday, December 4 | Tom Mueller

[SunkenCiv]

In English, verbs have a manageable four main forms: yodel, yodels, yodeled, yodeling. Spanish verbs have about 50. Classical Greek? Three hundred and fifty. "They might yodel (in the past) for themselves" (the first aorist middle optative third person plural) and "You are about to be having been yodeled" (the second person singular future perfect passive) are but two of the ways one can yodel in Greek. And just about the time you've memorized all the rules of verb formation, you discover that many Greek verbs are irregular anyway and recklessly break them... "Our love of what is beautiful does not lead to extravagance; our love of the things of the mind does not make us soft."

[SunkenCiv]

"From Hemispheres Magazine of United Airlines, November 2006 issue"

[SunkenCiv]

Serendipitously, this turned up in my standard news search for "string theory".

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[brooklyn dave]

Is there any way of saying in Classical Greek--go yodel yourself.

[CholeraJoe]

Those who might be of the Greek persuasion prefer not to associate with those individuals who shall have been deemed strange, unusual or might well be considered deranged.

Translation: "The Greeks don't want no freaks."

[colorado tanker]

I don't agree English has only "four main verb forms." As I recall from my Spanish, we had an English counterpart to all or almost all their forms. People may not know what they are, but they do use them.

[aristotleman]

Greek is one of the most florid and poetic languages on the planet.
Not an easy one though.
I find it much more pleasurable to express ideas in Greek than in any other
language.

[NYer]

Enjoy!

[AdmSmith]

I find it much more pleasurable to express ideas in Greek than in any other language

I agree, but I just use the Greek letters, thus no need to learn Greek:

[Physicist]

"You are about to be having been yodeled"

So "yodel" is a transitive verb in Greek? Extraordinary!

[TomSmedley]

However, the English verb only has two tenses: the past, and the not-past. To convey more specific notions of time, you need to add "helping verbs."

I love the regularity of Turkish grammar -- but the vocabulary is a major challenge! Esperanto you can teach yourself in a week or two, in part because of the obsessive regularity of the language. For example, Esperanto verbs end in -is, -as, and -os to indicate past, present, and future. One of the most dangerous men on the planet was born in an esperantist family that even changed their family name to an esperanto verb -- the future tense of the verb "to soar" -- I'm sure you've heard of George Soros.

[Kolokotronis]

"Greek is one of the most florid and poetic languages on the planet."

Indeed it is!

"Not an easy one though."

Are you kidding? I could speak it fluently at 3. Greece is filled with kids like that! :) Actually, its pronounced almost exactly as it is spelled and declines and conjugates quite logically compared to English. The hard part is developing the proper head and hand gestures to convey a sufficint level of hellenic disdain.

[lesser_satan]

bump

[bannie]

Nice thread. Full of Greeks.

:-)

Greece is one of the places I would most LOVE to visit.

[aristotleman]

One of the things that are missing on FR arguments/discussions, is the ability
to gesture. I still do it when I speak English, people look at me funny.

[Kolokotronis]

You mean like with the half cupped right hand in a circular motion whilst saying "Po, Po, Po"?

[SunkenCiv]

That I dunno. I think that was just the English verb example used?

[Dumb_Ox]

tis echei thn glotthn hellhnikhn?

[SunkenCiv]

Nope.

[eleni121]

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OPA!!!