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Lost with Latin
Posted: 25 November 2008
Word Count: 123
Summary: Not that I liked Latin but somehow you lose the mystery...
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Anno Domini was lost with Latin.
Adeste fideles, ad prima lux,
venite adoremus dominum.
Christus natus est. All lost with latin.
Who understands why Wenceslas was good?
Because he brought a poor man wine and bread?
Symbolic food. He could have had his head
for stealing wood on the king’s land. Instead
he took his cue from the divine; the Lord
of lords. Kingly forbearance, forgiveness,
grace, humility, celebrated in
chorus angelorum - lost with Latin
prayers of the Saints, the wisdom of wise men.
We comprehend so much more in the stars
here in the common era of TV,
information highways, rovers on Mars.
We comprehend so much and yet mistake
knowledge for wisdom, confidence for truth.
Anno Domini? Lost in translation.
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Comments by other Members
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 Nella at 12:37 on 25 November 2008
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Brilliant, Oonah. I like the way Anno Domini is repeated in the first and last lines, and then the "lost to Latin" transmutes to "lost in translation" in the last line. (Which last, of course, brings Scarlett Johannsen and Bob Murray to mind, but I try to shut that association out)
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BaMc at 14:12 on 25 November 2008
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Terrific, Oonah! Amazing sounds of the Latin suggestive of Christmas mass. Serious wisdom there too, I like
We comprehend so much and yet mistake
knowledge for wisdom, confidence for truth. |
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Barbara
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 V`yonne at 16:25 on 25 November 2008
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Thanks Robin. I deliberately7 used that association actually with the film because that film is all about how language and culture intermingle and transmute. It's like being dragged kicking & screaming into a cultural vortex. I think the tranference from AD to CE is a bit like that. Latin when I was at school was loaded with a set of cultural values. The loss of Latin and the change to CE is equally loaded. Whether a culture creates a language or a language, a culture, the language we use is never value free.
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V`yonne at 16:26 on 25 November 2008
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Thank you, Barbara, I really liked the idea that the wise4 men and Wenceslas and the people of the past still have something to say to us even in our 'common era'.
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 joanie at 20:12 on 25 November 2008
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Hi Oonah. Great response! I loved the Latin and the musings on the traditional Christmas themes. Although I loved the repetition, I wonder about the third stanza; it didn't work for me, but I can see the need to refer to modern things. I do like the final stanza - I keep returning to get my head around it!
Excellent.
joanie
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V`yonne at 20:24 on 25 November 2008
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Thank you Joanie. I just meant that we have so much more knowledge these days but not necessarily the wisdom to go with that. Anno Domini does not mean the common era so it is literally lost in the translation - we have new confidence but have we lost The Truth?
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Nella at 08:46 on 26 November 2008
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Thanks for your ruminations on language and culture, Oonah. It's a fascinating subject, isn't it?
| Anno Domini does not mean the common era so it is literally lost in the translation - we have new confidence but have we lost The Truth? |
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This is a very pertinent question.
Robin
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V`yonne at 11:56 on 26 November 2008
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Thanks Robin. I just loved the film Lost in Translation. I went and saw it on my own on a matinee and I came out feeling sand-blasted! That film has so much to say about language, cultural diversity, age, interpersonal relationships, religion, advertising... It's simply one of the best films I've ever seen and because it's 'hard to take' cinematographically, it says alot about film too. I don't have a copy and yet it runs in my head.
<Added>
Oh and Bill Murray should have got that Oscar!
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Nella at 15:54 on 26 November 2008
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I do have it on DVD and have watched it at least three times. Great movie! Glad you liked it, too. 
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 FelixBenson at 13:11 on 27 November 2008
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Fantastic Ooonah
lost with Latin
prayers of the Saints, the wisdom of wise men. |
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Profound and sophisticated!
Well done.
Kirsty
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