Here's what happens when you're teaching college these days: humorous cultural references go right over the head of many of your students.
This was brought home when I was teaching a humour writing class (ages 18-50), and started with a survey of the greatest skits of all time.
Remember this one? Wayne and Shuster (probably our best export from Canada) and the infamous
Rinse the Blood off my Toga.
Frank goes into Cicero's Bar (I have to snicker at that alone!) and strolls up to the bar:
Frank: "Give me a martinus.
Cicero: "You mean a martini."
Frank: "If I want more than one, I'll ask for it!"
Zing! Over the head of everyone in my class.
Honestly. Did they all miss the Latin slogan on Roger Ramjet? (let's see who remembers, in the comments)
Now, I went to high school in the mid-70s, when Latin had pretty well disappeared in BC and Ontario high schools. However, I had an Italian mother, and a Brit father who was a lover of Latin and the arcane. So early on, when learning street Italian, I got a taste of the Latin basics.
Things like (feel free to correct my spelling):
Nil illegitimi carborundum
(a Dad favourite, which he translated to: Don't Let the Bastards Grind You Down
Which brings me to this nifty little book that I was given a few years back.
LATIN FOR ALL OCCASIONS, by Henry Beard.
Truly, I wonder how the rest of the world manages without these handy translations. (Notice I've chosen ones that might be especially useful to my er family.)
I have a catapult. Give me all the money or I will fling an enormous rock at your head.
Catapultam habeo. Nisi pecuniam omnem mihi dabis ad caput tuum saxum immane mittam.
Di! Ecce hora! Exor mea me necabil!
I didn't expect you home so soon!
Non sperabam te domum tam cito revenire!
Do you by any chance happen to own a large, yellowish, very flat cat?
Estne tibi forte magna feles fulva et planissima?
Things to say to your Lawyer: You charge how much an hour?
Quantum in una hora imputas?
Watch out - you might end up divided into three parts, like Gaul.
Prospice tibi - ut Gallia, tu quoque in tres parte dividaris.
You and whose army?
Tutene Atque cuius exercitus?
What did you call me?
Quid me appellavisti?
And finally...bringing it back to me...
A comedian, huh?
ita vero esne comoedus?
(Any errors in spelling are mine.)
Next time I'll talk about how not a single person in my college fiction writing class could tell me the plot of Gone with the Wind, because nobody had seen it. (Let alone read it.) <Hits head against desk>
Melodie Campbell laments the demise of cultural references while writing wacky stuff in the True North. The Toronto Sun called her Canada's Queen of Comedy.
