Patricius by Niggle...

Everyone I know, with the exception of my esteemed and talented Latin teacher, uses the Ecclesiastical fashion of Latin pronunciation. I sometimes find this irritating, particularly given the fact that the Romans did not pronounce Latin in this way. I suppose that it's fair enough (well appropriate actually) to use the Ecclesiastical way when reading tracts or lessons in real Church Latin, but it sounds rather odd to me to listen to someone quoting Virgil or Horace and making tomfool ''ch'' and ''ts'' sounds and mispronouncing diphthongs. Caecilius, for example, sounds fairer to me pronounced in the Classical style than in the Ecclesiastical style - ''kai-kil-ee-us'' rather than ''chae-chil-ee-us.'' The same with Patricius - I say ''part-reek-ee-us'' rather than ''part-rich-ee-us.'' I was taught to read Classical Latin, and I suppose that I am being pedantic; and these are questions of taste rather than imperatives. I do like having the name Patricius though...

On a more humorous note, I found this site called Colloquia Cottidiana, which is Latin at ''the cat sat on the mat'' level. Going through it, I found a section on ''How are you?'' Readers may or may not find this funny, but I found this response humorous (particularly the highlighted part):

''Quomodo te habes, hodie? Infelix sum. Nihil pecuniae habeo. Unum amicum habeo, et ille mihi non placet! (How are you today? [I don't like that construction, I would say ''quomodo vales'' or ''quid agis''] I am unhappy. I have no money. I have one friend, and I don't like him! [literally: he is not pleasing to me].''

Friends. Real friends are few and far between. I have never had one (unless you count characters and places in books, which are generally more interesting than some people) but I have enjoyed reading about friends in works of literature. I had school-friends - or rather a small group of people who liked to listen to me talk about The Lord of the Rings on the rare occasions I went into the playground at break times. There was always something wrong with them though, or perhaps my ideal friend exists only in my mind. One of the downsides to having Asperger Syndrome is being at a great social disadvantage - it is not uncommon for children with Asperger Syndrome to desire friendships just as ardently as any other child. What usually follows, though, is rather like a mute trying to communicate something important verbally, finding that they can't, and then...

The title for this post was inspired by Leaf by Niggle, a short story by J.R.R Tolkien, which resonates with much of his own creative process. Having read this post back to myself and perhaps I needn't have bothered with the title, since I have been neither particularly meticulous nor coherent in writing this. The interesting impression I got from reading it (I only read it once though, I shall have to read it again) was the importance of knowing everything about everything, and doing one's best to find it all out. Niggle spent his entire life painting a Tree, and spent a good deal of his time painting each individual leaf, since they were all important and contributed to the whole. I shall perhaps devote a further post to friendship and Asperger Syndrome since I find that sort of thing interesting...

The above book, Tree and Leaf, contains the short story Leaf by Niggle, as well as other interesting works - particularly Tolkien's poem Mythopoeia, written to C.S Lewis.