Carpe Diem, Harry Mount
Carpe Diem, Harry Mount
1 Rating(s)
List: $15.99 | Sale: $11.20
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Carpe Diem
Put a Little Latin in Your Life

Author: Harry Mount

Narrator: Stephen Hoye

Unabridged: 5 hr 36 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Tantor Media

Published: 11/20/2007


Synopsis

In this lighthearted guided tour of Latin, journalist and former Latin tutor Harry Mount breathes life back into the greatest language of all, drawing on everything from a Monty Python grammar lesson to Angelina Jolie's tattoos. Filled with fascinating tidbits and humorous asides, Carpe Diem will delight the word lovers who made Eats, Shoots and Leaves such a monster hit.

Whether we're aware of it or not, Latin is all around us. Consider the sayings in everyday use: alter ego, ad nauseam, caveat emptor, modus operandi, per se, and, of course, the ever-popular e pluribus unum. Even more abundant are words derived from Latin roots: arena (from harena, meaning "sand"), auditorium ("a place of audience"), stadium (a running track)...and those are just the theatrical ones! It's inescapable. It's also the most daunting of languages, one that is seemingly obscure and filled with arcane rules and often accompanied by unpleasant memories of adolescence. But, as Mount says in Carpe Diem, "Knowing a bit of Latin is an invitation to the biggest room in the building, with a view down the corridor to all the succeeding ages. And you can get your hands on that invitation at any age."

About Harry Mount

Harry Mount was a Latin tutor before becoming a journalist. He graduated from Oxford University with a first class degree in ancient history. A deputy comment editor for the Daily Telegraph, he also writes for the Daily Mail, the Guardian, the Sunday Telegraph, and the New York Sun. He lives in London.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Michelle on July 11, 2011

I'm one of those weird folks who actually thinks it would be kind of groovy to learn Latin. However, I'm in my 40s so the brain is not as pliable regarding language acquisition. For those who studied Latin in school it will provide a great way to brush up. For folks like me, who are new to Latin it......more

Goodreads review by Colin on August 13, 2019

A brilliantly funny intro/refresher to the art of Latin grammar. By the end I had a nostalgic glow and a slight feeling of inferiority at only having done three years of it at school in the eighties. The end is an impassioned defence of classics in education. It's not exactly in keeping with the mod......more

Goodreads review by Kavi on May 08, 2023

“Looking back, I now feel the romance that pulses through the thin, dry veins of these devoted classics masters. It is a romance forged from this strange combination- of rigid rules of language coming up against the passionate, orgiastic, murderous history and literature of Italy when Italy was as r......more

Goodreads review by Immy on March 23, 2022

2.5 🌟 Somewhat interesting, I feel I got some understanding about the structure + cases of Latin, enjoyed the bits of vocabulary and etymology, but overall a bit too pop-linguistics trying to be funny for me.......more

Goodreads review by Deirdre on January 13, 2020

Neat little pocket guide to Roman culture and the Latin language......more