Wonderful list. Arete/ἀρετή immediately had me in self reflection examining where I've fallen short of my ideals.
I'd love to be skilled in Ancient Greek but alas it's not so. Unfortunately, my understanding of Ancient Grecian classics I've read comes only from English translations (Benjamin Jowett and others), and, no doubt, as good and as scholarly these translations are, my somewhat limited knowledge of modern languages such as French and German tells me that even the best translations fall short of the ideal—that of reading and understanding a text in its own language.
Every language has words whose meanings don't translate exactly into other languages, they've nuances that are lost in translation and even though skilled translators may understand their subtleties they have limited choices and must compromise.
More than ever, what this excellent little article has brought home to me is that those differences in meaning are much wider and more nuanced in Ancient Greek than in modern languages by virtue that ancient Greeks had a different perception of life and the world around them than those of us familiar with modern life.
It's logical sense that words used by those whose perceptions of life are foreign to ours have no simple or direct translation. However that could be to our advantage—with our newly acquired knowledge of these wonderful words it would nice if we could expand our own horizons. Perhaps difficult, but if we started using them in their Ancient Grecian context that may come with time (it seems those Ancient Greeks still have much to teach us).
Whilst I've considered these matters previously, reading this story has made them much more poignant
I'd love to be skilled in Ancient Greek but alas it's not so. Unfortunately, my understanding of Ancient Grecian classics I've read comes only from English translations (Benjamin Jowett and others), and, no doubt, as good and as scholarly these translations are, my somewhat limited knowledge of modern languages such as French and German tells me that even the best translations fall short of the ideal—that of reading and understanding a text in its own language.
Every language has words whose meanings don't translate exactly into other languages, they've nuances that are lost in translation and even though skilled translators may understand their subtleties they have limited choices and must compromise.
More than ever, what this excellent little article has brought home to me is that those differences in meaning are much wider and more nuanced in Ancient Greek than in modern languages by virtue that ancient Greeks had a different perception of life and the world around them than those of us familiar with modern life.
It's logical sense that words used by those whose perceptions of life are foreign to ours have no simple or direct translation. However that could be to our advantage—with our newly acquired knowledge of these wonderful words it would nice if we could expand our own horizons. Perhaps difficult, but if we started using them in their Ancient Grecian context that may come with time (it seems those Ancient Greeks still have much to teach us).
Whilst I've considered these matters previously, reading this story has made them much more poignant