#classicssuggestions

[basicallycicero]

this is the best review of any ancient text ive ever seen... sure to please communists and sexual deviants... sign me up

[basicallycicero]

everybody in the dark academia community be thinking latin is all romantic when in reality its crying over irregular verbs and wondering why the same verb means ‘wear’ and ‘wage war’

[basicallycicero]

[basicallycicero]

the more I think about the Aeneid, the more I realise that when we look at it through modern eyes, it becomes a novel about so much more than the founding of a city. We follow characters who are truly traumatised by all that they have suffered, and a reluctant hero who craves his mother’s comfort - with the weight of his ancestors and his descendants on his shoulders. Despite his own personal trauma, Aeneas must carry on through all the suffering and loss, in order to fulfill his purpose. Despite loosing the most important person in her life, Dido must flee her own country and start up a new kingdom entirely alone, and of course be doomed to meet a tragic end, as all she has worked for falls apart. Despite having his future set out before him, Turnus must fight for all that he had previously deemed so certain, and eventually have it all taken from him, including his life. Surely as modern readers, these tales resonate with us in an entirely new and powerful manner - we can all relate to having to plough through trauma and tragedy despite our own emotions, to feeling alone, craving comfort, being thrown into uncertainty, loosing battles we thought we would win. And the beauty of the Aeneid is the sheer complexity of each one of the characters: hero through one eye, villain through another. It is more than a study of what it means to be roman, it is a study of what it means to be human.

[basicallycicero]

“My love for you was greater than my wisdom.”

- Euripides, Medea

[basicallycicero]

me when I stub my toe

[basicallycicero]

pliny the elder be like: sees massive volcano eruption and rows over to see what’s poppin’

[basicallycicero]

Augustus be writing the res gestae like: me me ME it’s all about ME bitch

no bitch i created myself through propaganda