I wanna read the classics but every time i do i end up stopping every page and looking up a word i don't understand...

I wanna read the classics but every time i do i end up stopping every page and looking up a word i don't understand, should i just give up and live a brainlet life? Pic related, i was planning on reading it.

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literatureandhistory.com
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look up a word
and then memorize it
surprise, you expanded your vocabulary!

This podcast is a great resource to fill in the gaps. It provides a solid foundation for those lacking a classical education.

literatureandhistory.com

I like the artwork user, do you have anymore greek vibes via painting?

Maybe try a translation that isn't 300 years old.

Fuckoff pleb Pope is the greatest translation and is even better than the original Greek, I bet you read Fagles and put that flimsy paperback on your bookshelf and feel proud about it.

Which translation we think is best is beside the point, which is what would best alleviate the problem OP is experiencing.

There's like 10 words at a time that i don't know, it'll take me years to finish the iliad at this pace

as you read you will encounter fewer and fewer words that you do not know the meaning of, additionally try to use critical thinking and context to figure out the definition before looking it up. that will help you with words that are not in the dictionary, like in many sci-fi and fantasy novels.

read an easier book? A lot of people say start with the Greeks, but sometimes the Greeks can be pretty impenetrable to the inexperienced reader. You can go for something in one of those entry level book charts, and you'll probably both understand it better and get more out of it

Is there not a faster way to look up words like an app or something? I think the task of opening up the dictionary and looking through a thousand words also contributes to my frustration.

This OP
Start with the Greeks assumes reading experience. Which you should have, but this is the current year, start with some softball classics from the last 60 years

Yes, "start with the Greeks", when suggested seriously, means for one to start with the Greeks in a study of the Western Canon. If you aren't trying to pursue something like that then just read whatever you want. Try the classics again at a later point.

Also, OP, I would be curious to know what translation of the Iliad you are reading. That may be part of your problem.

You're not reading the Greeks, you're reading Pope, Fagets, Mandible, etc.

I'm reading Pope

You're deliberately making things difficult for yourself then. I suggest you get a modern translation such as Fagles. You'll find it much easier going.

just write em down (+the meaning). then at the end of every reading session, review the meaning of the words and recall how they were used.

>wahhhh i actually have to put some work in

>modern translation
>Dude brah, like, look at those waves, man. They, like, totally look like beer!
>Bro, totally!

Use a dictionary app then? I use Merriam-Webster

>Fuckoff pleb Pope is the greatest translation and is even better than the original Greek
What a laughable post. Kill yourself

Queck

>Its like totally fucking brutal for a young chad to lay there owned by a bronze lacrosse stick he still looks fit af, but for some old geezer to get pissed on by stray doggos thats just sad man.

If you have an ereader it will help with that, as at least for kindles you can hover over a word and it gives you a definition, if not just use the context to guess what the word is and if that fails then look it up

>Merriam-Webster

Here's how we read it in HS, though this was for the Aeneid, but we were literally translating it line by line and it was awesome. Took a full fuckin year though, but that was stopping in class for brainless and such.

>get common easy to read English version
>get version in Greek/Latin with all translation references inside
>read in English to understand the story, then go back to OG language to understand the depth of poetry and full in-context meaning

It's actually pretty baller, I've got a chance to do something similar in an odyssey class, and I think I'm gonna take it. Learning how fucking clever the classics of western lit are is insane. Like paradise lost and shit is awesome, but the wordplay Latin does is far beyond what we can even imagine

Bad for the eyes, but if you read on a tablet/kindle it has the facility to highlight and search definitions.

You're obviously on the internet. Type it into Google.

don't try reading Moby Dick then