Reading Vergil in Translation

Hello Students!

Vergil is not "light" summer reading as you may have learned already, but it's time for us to get psyched for it! Slower going and less repetitious than Homer's epics, The Aeneid is also /shorter/. I have a hunch that once you get acclimated to it, especially in Fagles' translation (which is beautiful), it will carry you away.

If you're SAILING through it, keep it up but try to make some notes to yourself. You can write in the book if you want to...it's yours!

If you're finding it slow going, PACE yourself. There's more than a week until school starts. There are only 12 books. So, take no more than two books a day but do it every day.

And then, do some prep for one or more of your other AP classes and also be certain to PLAY. That's right, I said play. Reward yourself and come back and do it again the next day...but if you make it a gigantic, do-it-all-in-one-day-and-get-it-over-with ordeal, then you're going to feel bummed out.

Trust me...from someone who wrote a dissertation (and I worked both ways but the day-to-day approach is way more fun) which is a really time-consuming and potentially discouraging project.

Please e-mail me with your concerns as they pop up!

Yours, Dr. Matteo