A Conversation for Handy Latin Phrases
It's cool to get it a bit wrong.
Mordred Started conversation Mar 10, 2004
This reminds me of something that happened on Question Time recently. To make some point Clive James tried to recall the Latin poser 'Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?' (Who will guard the guards themselves?)- but, unable to recall the exact phrasing, he paraphrased it thus: 'Quis custodiet custodientes?'(Who will guard those who are guarding?: an acceptable approximation.) Anne Widdecome then butted in and gave the correct quotation. What do we conclude from this? 1) that Clive James has an imperfect memory but is able to deliver grammatical Latin on the hoof as the occasion demands, and 2) that Anne Widdecombe can memorize Latin sentences, but for all we know might not understand a single word of Latin. Hence, thanks to his blunder, Clive James comes out looking the more impressive of the two.
Also, shouldn't the quote at the top of the page have 'videtur' and not 'viditur'?
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It's cool to get it a bit wrong.
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