Front matter

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Contents Introduction A Roman School A Roman Wedding

TWO LATIN PLAYS FOR HIGH-SCHOOL STUDENTS

BY

SUSAN PAXSON

INSTRUCTOR IN LATIN IN THE OMAHA HIGH SCHOOL

GINN AND COMPANY

BOSTON · NEW YORK · CHICAGO · LONDON ATLANTA · DALLAS · COLUMBUS · SAN FRANCISCO

COPYRIGHT, 1911, BY SUSAN PAXSON ALL RIGHTS RESERVED 522.10

The Athenæum Press

GINN AND COMPANY · PROPRIETORS · BOSTON · U.S.A.

CUI BONO?

If this little entertainment shall give pleasure and be of profit to any who have set out on their toilsome journey into the realm of Latin Literature, the writer’s aim will be accomplished

PREFATORY NOTE

I am greatly indebted to Mrs. C. H. Beeson and to Professor Frank J. Miller, of the University of Chicago. To the former, for her most scholarly and generous assistance in the correcting of the manuscript and for her many valuable suggestions throughout the work; to the latter, for his painstaking reading of the proof and for his kindly and helpful interest. In fact, it was largely due to the helpful uplift that came to some of my advanced classes, as well as to myself, from the presentation of Professor Miller’s “Dramatizations from Vergil” that these little plays were written.

SUSAN PAXSON

CONTENTS

PAGE

Introduction ix

A Roman School 1

Costumes 16

A Roman Wedding 19

Costumes and Suggestions 37

INTRODUCTION

In response to the invitation of the author and publishers, I am glad to stand godfather to this little book of original Latin plays. They are the product of an enthusiastic teacher coöperating with students whom she has, in part by this means, inspired with a genuine interest in Roman life and its expression in the Latin tongue. They offer a helpful contribution to the solution of the ever-present and vexing problem which teachers of Latin in secondary schools are meeting: How can we make this Latin interesting to our pupils? How can we compete with departments which more easily hold the pupils’ interest because their subject matter touches more nearly the various phases of modern life? It is, indeed, true that any subject well taught by a live teacher will interest pupils. But, even where this condition is realized, the need is being felt more and more of something which will vary the deadly monotony incident to the learning of the technique of a language, especially one which makes its appeal largely to the eye alone through the medium of the printed page.

It is one of the most encouraging features of our present-day classical work that teachers more and more are inventing ways of vitalizing their teaching without weakening it. For this must always be borne in mind: that we are not seeking to gain mere interest. What we want is interest in Latin. We want our students to be so interested that they will cheerfully endure all the hardships incident to this study because they have discovered that it is worth while in itself, because it has come to mean something to them, because it actually touches their own lives.

If the reader will scan the department of “Current Events” in the present volume of the Classical Journal, he will find many indications of this new spirit among classical teachers in the schools. Thus we find a Latin club in a high school in Columbus, Ohio, giving, among other activities, an exhibition of a Roman triclinium, in which the whole scene was enacted as nearly as possible in the Roman fashion, accompanied by Latin songs. And thus the pupils were made to realize that the Roman’s life was not entirely one of warfare, but that he ate, drank, and acted as a real human being. In Kansas, a classical club was recently organized by the students of Hiawatha Academy, whose program consists of talks on classical subjects and Latin songs, followed by a social hour enlivened by Latin games. In Lincoln, Nebraska, a live Latin club has originated in an exceptionally strong Cæsar class. They call themselves the Legio Decima, because they scorn “anything that has to do with cavalry”! Their program abounds in live topics connected with the Latin work and unique representations of Roman life.

But the greatest success seems to have been gained through the dramatic presentation of matter pertinent to the students’ work. We read of a spirited entertainment by the students of a Seattle high school, in which were given scenes from the “Menaechmi” of Plautus, together with the singing of several odes of Horace which had been set to appropriate music. Others have attempted a play of Terence. Scores of schools have presented dramatized scenes from Vergil; and we read of a school in Georgia where Horace’s ninth satire, itself a complete little drama as it stands, was played by the students. In the same school portions of Cæsar were dramatized and acted; and a dramatization based on the conspiracy of Catiline was recently sent to me from a school in Indiana.

From all these and many other points it is reported that great interest is aroused among the students, primarily in the fact and production of the play itself, but resulting also in a permanent interest in the more serious and regular work of the Latin class. The author of the plays presented in this book has herself already reaped rich rewards of her work in the continued zeal of her students for their Latin study after they have passed on to college. She writes that the boy who played “Cicero” in the wedding last year is now a freshman in an eastern college, and still finds Latin the work of his greatest interest and success; and the girl who was “Tullia” in the play is also a freshman in college, with zeal and courage enough to attempt the composition of Latin hymns.

The difficulty heretofore felt by teachers and their Latin clubs has been in finding appropriate plays in Latin simple enough for their pupils to master without undue hardship, and appealing strongly in their subject matter to the young student; and I feel sure that in these two plays, “A Roman School” and “A Roman Wedding,” will be found just the material which has been sought. Aside from the awakened interest of the student and the vivid impression which his mind will receive of these two important phases of Roman life, who can estimate the actual gain in the acquisition of the Latin language itself, which will come not alone to those students who are fortunate enough to take part in these plays, but to those as well who listen to the rehearsals and to the final production?

I therefore most cordially commend these plays to all teachers of Latin, and urge that they be presented in the schools each year wherever possible.

FRANK JUSTUS MILLER

The University of Chicago