Latin: Story of a World Language
[A] must-read for anyone interested either in the status of Latin or in what Latinity has signified throughout any previous epoch of its existence. (Ben Lee and Branden KoschBryn Mawr Classical Review2010-10-04)Latin might be classified as a long-dead language--but this work reminds us that no one has informed Latin of that fact. (Bettany HughesProspect2013-11-01)Long, nay, longer live the dead! Latin as a literary language became fixed as early as the first century BCE, only to thrive and flourish for almost two more millennia.Leonhardthas written a delightfully illuminating life of this supposedly dead world language. (Christopher B. Krebs, author ofA Most Dangerous Book: Tacitus's Germania from the Roman Empire to the Third Reich)Latin hasn’t seen a revival since the ninth century under western Europe’s first emperor, Charlemagne, in the wake of the Carolingian literary renaissance of the late eighth century. Time for it to be great again.Leonhardtchronicles the language from its origins in the classical period to its official end in 1806. He asserts that in losing competence in reading Latin text, we are losing conversations about the world’s greatest literature by influential thinkers. An important book for lovers of language. (Annalisa PesekLibrary Journal2013-11-13)Given that the newly mitred Pope Francis is a freak for Latin, and that the Vatican’s two most recent Latin czars have been clerics from the American Midwest, stateside Catholics and Latin nerds alike should be frothy-mouthed at the new, significantly expanded edition ofJürgen Leonhardt’sLatin: Story of a World Language, translated with elegance by Kenneth Kronenberg…Leonhardt’s tour through Latin’s post-Roman afterlives, and his own experience speaking the language, galvanize a very neat argument that blends a linguistic approach (which has pronounced Latin dead) with a cultural-historical approach (by which standard Latin is merelydecrepit!). Learned and accessible, the book is stuffed with funny little anecdotes, from early Arab scholars grappling with the language to Angelina Jolie gettingquod me nutrit me destruittattooed on her lower abdomen. (Ted ScheinmanSlate Book Review2013-12-03)The core strength ofLeonhardt’s book is its discussion of how a language becomes a world language and how a canon forms…Kenneth Kronenberg’s translation, done collaboratively with Leonhardt, escortsLatininto English. Kronenberg translates German culture, too, sometimes substituting references to Rilke with those to Auden and T.S. Eliot. Leonhardt credits Kronenberg with making ‘parts of the English edition better than the German original.’ NowLatincan make its case in today’s world language. (Willis G. ReigerChronicle of Higher Education2013-12-09)A neat little primer on the history of the Latin language. (Steve DonoghueOpen Letters Monthly2013-12-29)Latinprovides us with a deeper way of understanding the relationship between European culture and the language that sustained it for more than a thousand years…Latinreminds us that understanding our past can help to shape our future. (Gerald J. RuselloNew Criterion2014-03-01)