Carpe Diem by Harry Mount

When I was in the third grade the Chicago Public Schools determined that I was gifted and shipped me off to the gifted & talented program at Luther Burbank Elementary School. One of the classes I had in addition to Literature, Science, English, Social Studies, etc. was Latin. The gifted program was modeled after English schools with a serious nod towards the classics. (And we even learned the recorder in Music class. Jethro Tull's "Mother Goose" will always be a favorite.) I also took a year of it in high school where I was taught by an old Jewish woman who took some time out from nearly every class to inveigh against Vatican II. On the plus side, I had the wonderful experience of reading Caesar's Gallic Wars in the original. "Gallia est omnis divisa in partes tres."

For those who never had the experience of having taken Latin, then Harry Mount's Carpe Diem: Put a Little Latin in Your Life is probably closest to the real thing.

The book is part Latin course, part argument for the relevancy of the language today, and part memoir. Scattered throughout are brief lessons for those seeking to learn Latin. But Mount takes it easy on the reader, at least compared to the teachers you'd find in a school. He introduces all the concepts I had drilled into my head – verb tenses, noun declensions, cases, etc. – but he doesn't prod the reader to spend hours conjugating verbs and the like to really learn the language.

When not giving a grammar lesson, Mount spends a bit of time recalling his days as a Latin student turned Latin tutor. Much of this material makes more sense to English readers who endured the education system over there but some of the tales have a universal appeal to Latin students. One example that surely every one of us who has tried to learn the language can recognize is the famous scene from Monty Python's Life of Brian when Brian gets a Latin lesson from a centurion when trying to write graffiti saying "Romans go home". Mount gives a full transcript and I was laughing to myself the whole time. Those of us who've had Latin know that this is perhaps the funniest scene in the whole of cinema.

Those who aren't interested in learning the language or aren't simpatico with those of us who spent hours going "amo, amas, amat" will still appreciate the many pages dedicated to the influence of Latin on English. While not a Romance language, a large chunk of our vocabulary comes from Latin and many Latin phrases and expressions were imported intact. (E.g. – "e.g." and "carpe diem".) The book also notes the influence of Rome on such things as architecture with the various types of columns.

As an introduction to the Latin language and the influence of Rome, Carpe Diem succeeds. Mount writes plainly and with a good sense of humor. Neophytes will no doubt enjoy learning the Latin roots of many English words and marvel at how sloppy English is in contrast to the structure and order of the Roman tongue. While the book is not an academic treatise, Mount does make a pretty good case for Latin, as far as dead languages go. Simply put, while learning a living language like Spanish may have more practical value, learning Latin and about Rome can not only be rewarding in itself, but will also provide a solid foundation for understanding Western civilization.