For people wishing to learn Greek there is nothing more suitable, nothing better to read. And that is not simply my opinion, but that of Theodore Gaza, a man of much learning in all fields. When he was asked which Greek author should be read assiduously by people wishing to learn Greek, he replied, "Only Aristophanes," because he was very witty, rich, erudite and pure in his Attic language.
Graece discere cupientibus nihil aptius, nihil melius legi potest, non meo solum iudicio, quod non magnifacio, sed etiam Theodori Gazae, viri undecunque doctissimi, qui, interrogatus quis ex Graecis auctoribus assidue legendus foret Graecas literas discere volentibus, respondit: 'Solus Aristophanes,' quod esset sane quam acutus, copiosus, doctus et merus Atticus.
"A peculiar anthologic maze, an amusing literary chaos, a farrago of quotations, a mere olla podrida of quaintness, a pot pourri of pleasant delites, a florilegium of elegant extracts, a tangled fardel of old-world flowers of thought, a faggot of odd fancies, quips, facetiae, loosely tied" (Holbrook Jackson, Anatomy of Bibliomania) by a "laudator temporis acti," a "praiser of time past" (Horace, Ars Poetica 173).
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Thursday, July 27, 2017
Only Aristophanes
Aldus Manutius, preface to the editio princeps of Aristophanes (1498), tr. N.G. Wilson: