I'm curious about something. In that early scene where five or six guys are sitting in a room reading aloud, they all read in a stumbling, halting, insecure way, even though the passages are just basic English and not prohibitively difficult. That's how I sound when I read Spanish! As an American, I thought anyone who got into Oxbridge had to be pretty smart, so what's with all the remedial reading?
They are not just reading a text, they are translating from either Greek or Latin, I do not remember exactly which - and that might sound a little stumbling.
shareOh, thank you! Of course, eighty years ago a dollop of Classics would still have been de riguer at an elite school.
shareIt was Greek.
Just sayin'.
It was Plato's Symposium, so it was definitely in Greek. The first time I saw the scene, my initial impression was the same - what is someone who can barely read doing at Cambridge, but then it became obvious when the Dean referred to the "unspeakable vice" of the Greeks.
share[deleted]