Monday, May 16, 2016
Insolent Puppy!
R.G. Ussher (1927-2006), "A bird that most resembles a black swan: Juvenal VI, 165. A valedictory lecture," Hermathena 185 (Winter, 2008) 7-20 (at 14):
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'To read and re-read the scanty remains now left to us of the literature of Ancient Greece, is a pleasant and not a laborious task...' That was the cheerful assurance with which [Gilbert] Murray, the famous Australian-born Hellenist, greeted the readers of the Preface to his History of Ancient Greek Literature. The pleasure of reading Greek indeed is undeniable, but even in 1897 able classicists felt bound to deny that it was easy, and Henry Jackson, in the margin of his copy, inscribed succinctly 'Insolent young puppy!'C.M. Bowra (1898-1971) gives the exclamation as "Insolent puppy!" in his Memories, 1898-1939 (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1967), p. 220. I don't know if Jackson's copy of Murray's book survives.
