Sallust' Bellum Catilinae

[Edward H. Campbell]

I'm writing a lengthy work, Discontents at Rome: 63 B.C., which is based on on Sallust's Bellum Catilinae which will include a completly new translation, text and commentary of both the Bellum Catilinae and Cicero's In Catilinam I-IV

The current manuscript as yet contains a lot of erata, but I'm getting the work done as my circumstances permit. At any rate I would appreciate any constructive criticism, but be forewarned I maintain that Catiline was at least as bad as he was made out to be.

The manuscript in its current state is attached in PDF


http://inopibuspressseattle.blogspot.com/

[Matthew Moore]

What level of criticism would you like? Content? Presentation? I have to confess, the moment I start reading anything, I begin to read like a teacher, so I want to make sure I know what filter I am using.

[Edward H. Campbell]

I don't know. I'm neither a teacher nor really a student either. I’m just an independent artist with little resources to tackle a project of this size. I'm just the guy who sits on the sidewalk, or in front of the grocery store asking for "spare change." So keep in mind I sometimes don't even have the books that I really need and so forth. As an outsider too I have no real obligation to support the regime in the institutions, so I probably say a few things that those who teach within them would not say.

But I suppose the one thing I was wondering is whether or not I succeeded in convicting Catiline or not. But here are several other subtexts as well for instance there's an alleged defense of Classical Studies. In that, and what follows I try to refute Heidegger's thesis that the Greek is the original and the Latin effectively a counterfeit of it. That thesis seems to be fairly common in the academy, but I do not think it is correct. For instance, there seems to be among the Greek students a tendency to sneer at Latin because they've been persuaded to believe that it is somehow inferior because, for instance, Plato wrote in Greek. But I try to defend the idea that there is a need for both because these two cultures were inextricably bound together by the Trojan War and that one cannot fully understand the one without an understanding of the other. I have to wonder whether or not anyone finds the argument there convincing. There’s also a defense of “dualism.”

Obviously there are a lot of translations left for me to render by my own hands. I could easily spend another year or two working on those and fixing typographical errors, and so forth.

[Keith Massey]

This sounds fantastic. I'll read this over and get back to you with feedback. I've been just now reading through Sallust's descriptions of Cataline with my Latin IV class, and they enjoy the descriptions of Cataline's depravity and that of his friends. I showed them clips of the nasties from Blazing Saddles and the Cantina scene from Star Wars to set the stage.

Keith

[Edward H. Campbell]

Thanks Keith,

I've attached a copy of it in its current state.

--Ted