Greek Literature

Abstract

The Cambridge Grammar of Classical Greek(CGCG) arrived just too late for mention in the last batch of reviews, but the wait has turned out to be providential: I've now had time to useCGCGas my reference grammar for undergraduate teaching. I must confess that I do not like teaching grammar, and am not very good at it; and, by happy chance, I have not been called upon to teach grammar for a surprisingly large number of years. So being assigned to teach a grammar class at short notice was a mildly traumatic experience. But at least it has made it possible for me to become familiar withCGCGin practice. The authors’ suggestion that ‘CGCG’s coverage is such…that it could be used in the context of undergraduate and graduate language courses’ (xxxii) is carefully formulated: it could be. But the undergraduate class that I have been teaching would, I am sure, have been intimidated by the mass of grammatical detail if confronted withCGCGin the raw. I can, however, testify that at least one reluctant, out-of-practice language tutor has found the volume amazingly helpful in planning grammar classes. The clarity and logic of its presentation and explanations, its well-chosen examples, and its carefully designed aids to navigation (table of contents, cross-references, index) are virtues that I do not normally associate with texts on grammar: or, at any rate, not in the same degree.CGCG’s virtues will make it an invaluable resource for advanced students, and for tutors. For a surprisingly reasonable price, purchasers get 300 pages of phonology and morphology and 350 pages of syntax, plus 90 excellent pages on textual coherence, covering particles, and word order. ‘Still’, as the authors modestly observe, ‘there are many subjects about which we might have said much more and some about which we have said almost nothing’ (xxxii).