/lit/ - Literature

[Anonymous No.19731761]

Except for the Iliad, the extant latin literature is better than the extant greek literature. The greek canon is more or less:

Poets: Homer, Hesiod,Sappho, Alcaeus, Pindar, Aeschylus, Sophocles, Aristophanes, Euripides, Menander, Theocritus, Callimachus, Apollonius Rhodius
Historians: Herodotus, Xenophon, Thucydides
Prose writers: Plato, Aristotle, Theophrastus, Plutarch

The latin canon:

Poets: Lucretius, Virgil, Horace, Ovid, Catullus, Tibullus, Propertius, Lucan, Persius, Martial, Plautus , Terence
Historians: Caesar, Sallust, Livy, Cornelius Nepos, Suetonius, Tacitus
Prose writers: Cicero, Vitruvius, Seneca, Petronius, Pliny

to me, the Romans win

[Anonymous No.19731766]

>>19731761
to me, the Sneedams win

[Anonymous No.19731785]

>>19731766
Start with the Chucks

[Anonymous No.19731795]

>>19731761
Utterly false, the Greek tragedians remain unequaled in their expressive dramatic psychological genius to this day.

[Anonymous No.19731822]

i forgot the great Statius for the latin canon.
i would also like to add that latin culture is the reason why (latin speaking) Europe produced so many poetry and prose works compared to the byzantines. Goethe would have never been possible without Shakespeare, Shakespeare would have never been possible without Petrarch, Petrarch (or Dante) would have never been possible without the Latins. Latin speaking Europe knew the greeks very late in the Renaissance, all the great medieval and early renaissance /lit/ stems only from the Latins.

>>19731795
Lucan is better than Euripides, Ovid is better than Sophocles and Lucretius is way better than Aeschylus

[Anonymous No.19731836]

Ovid alone mogs all of greeks although that just might be my bias of being able to read in latin. Greek tragedies are overrated in general and I fell asleep reading Laundry List of Ships that is Iliad

[Anonymous No.19731844]

Aurelius would add another 5 points to Romans too if you include him.

[Anonymous No.19731877]

Roman philosophy is self-help tier and their science when not done by a Greek is engineering bullshit. All Romans cared about was practical shit like engineering, architecture, and Law. Romans were the midwits of the ancient world.

[Anonymous No.19731883]

>>19731836
>Ovid
wrote the best ancient work of mythology ever. i challenge anybody here to name a better mythology book than his Metamorphoses .
that said, the Iliad is out of this competition for obvious superiority.

[Anonymous No.19731895]

I just love all of them so much

[Anonymous No.19731900]

>>19731877
"philosophy" is an irrelevant word.
the romans had better poets and better prose writers (essayists) , you won't find in any greek writers the same observations on Nature of Lucretius, Seneca or Pliny. Overall, the romans had a better feeling for the beauty of Nature and of the empirical reality than the Greeks, who were more into drama and metaphysics.

[Anonymous No.19731976]

>>19731761
Roman "literature" be like:
In the year of consul Pubicus Hairus, Smallus Dickus led 3 legions to Gaul to quell a revolt of the assfaggot tribe, killing 600000 and taking their leader's son as a hostage and sex slave.
Repeat x 100

[Anonymous No.19732216]

>>19731822
That's not true. Medieval and Renaissance writers were aware of the Greeks. The Romans couldn't stfu about them, for God's sake. Why couldn't the Romans stfu about the Greeks? They were far more indebted to them than any culture has been to another. When you read Latin, you see Greek all over the place. Such is not the case for Greek.

[Anonymous No.19732219]

Roman? Greek?
ENTER THE THIRD PLAYER

[Anonymous No.19732390]

>>19732216
yeah, this is the common place that led people to appreciate the greeks vicariously , that is , through the romans. as if all roman achievements were due to the greeks by default , which is false.
in respect to medieval europe, apart from the fact that "being aware" =! "reading and knowing" , the commitment of the romans to the greeks was overplayed in the 19th century, and surely the difference between the 2 civilizations in clear , beyond the most superficial elements. almost all french intellectuals from the birth of france to the 20th century deemed Rome way superior. Descartes, the founder of modern philosophy , couldn't read greek and avoided all greek-derived terms.
that said, when you weight and compare the 2 literatures themselves (latin and greek) , i think the latin literature is simply superior.

[Anonymous No.19732927]

>>19731761
Roman histories, law and pratical works blow the fuck out of the Greeks at the very least.

[Anonymous No.19733017]

>>19731761
Based solely on Herodotus and Homer, the Greeks win. The Roman's have no one who can match them

[Anonymous No.19733019]

>>19731836
>Ovid
Should I read him before starting on roman historians? I've already read the aeneid

[Anonymous No.19733026]

>>19732216
This guy gets it

[Anonymous No.19733037]

>>19731900
Are you serious? Lucretius literally only translated Epicurus, and Seneca did the same to Epictetus. Read a book.

[Anonymous No.19733662]

>>19733037
1) epictetus was 15 yo when seneca died , you absolute mongoloid.

2) epicurus has nothing to do with lucretius, except that the latter exploited the former to validate his atheism. neither epicurus nor epictetus were interested in natural research, unlike the two romans. lucretius gifted humanity with the most beautiful images the ancient world ever conceived. in respect to lucretius, but also ovid, everything the greeks wrote is a pile of trash.
lucretius was such a great poet that even the christians couldn't help transcribing the manuscripts of the rerum natura over the centuries. this was a literal miracle.

[Anonymous No.19734256]

>>19732927
>this compilation of old Roman recipes btfos Herodotus and Aeschylus because... it just does ok!?!

[Anonymous No.19734322]

>>19731761
Where is Cassius Dio? He's better than all historians other than Livy.

[Anonymous No.19734350]

>>19734256
read germania by tacitus, retard.

[Anonymous No.19736370]

>>19731761
The Iliad sucks, it's not even remotely believable. I heard someone call it "Ancient Capeshit" previously and I thought it was a joke but that's actually a very accurate description, what a useless book.

[Anonymous No.19736639]

>>19731761
Philosophy: the greeks btfo the romans

Everything else: the romans won by a lot

[Anonymous No.19736714]

>>19731761
Nice bait

[Anonymous No.19736755]

>>19736370
Did you really go into the Iliad thinking it was going to be believable?

[Anonymous No.19737122]

>>19736370
lol filtered by s tier literature

[Anonymous No.19737129]

>>19734350
And?

[Anonymous No.19737145]

>>19731761
Terrible bait. Ignoring the fact that most Roman literature was just watered down Greek fan-fiction, there's not a single truly great Roman poet or writer besides Virgil. Romans were truly philistines.

[Anonymous No.19737164]

>>19737145
>there's not a single truly great Roman poet or writer besides Virgil
I know you cant read Latin so your opinion doesn't matter.

[Anonymous No.19737209]

>>19737145
high school tier take

[Anonymous No.19737243]

What a stupid useless thread and point and topic. I can tell you love to sniff your own ass.

look at all these books ive read! Romans> greeks *MASSIVE INHALE OF MY OWN FART*

[Anonymous No.19737287]

>lists a series of greeks
>lists a series of romans
>refuses to elaborate on why one set is better than the other
>leaves

[Anonymous No.19737297]

>>19737145
An ill-informed "opinion" so embarrassing I couldn't even utter it on an anonymous forum without blushing.

[Anonymous No.19737310]

>>19736370
>the Iliad is not even remotely believable
huh? I thought being turned into a pig by a hot slut was the normal experience of a bronze age sailor??

[Anonymous No.19737571]

does a bear shit in the woods?
of course the Romans did it better, they were the better race.

[Anonymous No.19738027]

All Roman literature is from Greece.
The Romans dropped all aspects of their traditional styles for Greek ones so they were totally lost.

[Anonymous No.19738187]

>>19737310
>>19736755
There is plenty of fiction with supernatural occurrences that have a semblance of realism because of the depth and behavior of the characters. One example that comes to mind would be Leskov's The Sealed Angel. But the Iliad does not have any semblance of realism. The characters are so incredibly flat that it is impossible to hear their dialogue without being conscious that this is something the author made up.

[Anonymous No.19738192]

>>19738187
> realism
> psychology
please go back to your insurance service office desk, or to your field of patatoes, peasant. this is not a thread for you.

[Anonymous No.19738607]

>>19736370
>The Iliad sucks, it's not even remotely believable.
It's not meant to.

https://scholars-stage.org/how-i-taught-the-iliad-to-chinese-teenagers/
"Imagine, I say, the following scenario: you boot up a game like Call of Duty. But just before your bullet kills one of your enemies, the action suddenly pauses. You now have to play through a short visual novel, where you see the childhood or the wedding of the NPC you are fighting. Just when the scene ends, you return to the battle, your foe dead at your feet.
What would it feel like to play that game? Why does Homer force us through an analogous narrative trip every time one of our heroes gets into a fight?
Just as significant: Homer gives this honor to both the Greeks and the Trojans. Homer was a Greek. All of these vignettes of Trojan domesticity, I told my Chinese students, would be as if the WWII dramas on Chinese television gave little domestic stories for each Japanese soldier the communists killed!"

[Anonymous No.19738625]

>>19738027
>What is Caesar

[Anonymous No.19738639]

>>19731761
I agree. Greek literature doesn't really have a Petronius or a Lucretius, who were absolute geniuses and some of the most original writers that the world ever saw.

The Aeneid is better than the Iliad, and probably as good as the Odyssey.

Pliny is an absolute Sacred Monster and not a single Greek writer comes close. Naturalis Historia is one of the main pillars of Western world.

Also, you forgot Marcus Aurelius, Lucan and especially Apuleius. How can one ignore Apuleius is beyond me.

[Anonymous No.19738853]

Is there any point to this type of conversation if you can't read both Latin and Greek? I've been enjoying myself to an extent but can't help but feel like it's a waste reading the Greeks in English.

[Anonymous No.19738972]

>>19738639
>Lucretius
>genius
this board has some of the funniest takes on the internet, I swear lol

[Anonymous No.19738995]

>>19738853
It's only useless if you're comparing stuff like metrics, stylistics, grammatical quirks, etc. The thought usually remains the same in both English/whatever-other-modern-language-you-use-to-read-classics and Greek/Latin.

[Anonymous No.19739013]

>>19738607
>>19738187
>>19737310
>>19736370
>>19736755
LMAOOO You are all modern cucks. There's a fucking reason the gods don't meddle in our affairs anymore: they'd have to deal with your pathetic asses and that'd be debasing for them.

Go read history books based on "muh duhcuments" and academic consensus. fags

[Anonymous No.19739041]

>>19738639
>Greek literature doesn't really have a Petronius or a Lucretius, who were absolute geniuses
..........................what?

[Anonymous No.19739076]

>>19739013
Wrong, the Greek "gods" were demons and their power to manifest themselves has waned more and more the longer they have been disconnected from the light of heaven.

[Anonymous No.19739242]

>>19738972
>>19739041
>american monolingual retards who base their opinions on whether an author is in the Penguin paperback series or not strike again

[Anonymous No.19740431]

>>19737571
Romans are dead. Greeks are still around. Tell me again who’s the better race you Romaboo faggot

[Anonymous No.19740591]

>>19740431
French, Spanish, Italian, etc are all direct descendants of Latin. Don't forget that the Catholic Church is also still around.

[Anonymous No.19740609]

>>19739242
>BAGHH AMERICAN THIS AMERICAN THAT AAAGH
rent-free

[Anonymous No.19740641]

>>19734350
You mean the ancient equivalent of a NYT article to elicit "self-reflection" in the populace?

[Anonymous No.19740662]

>>19731761
Nonnus, various anonymous authors of things like the Homeric Hymns, Apocrypha, Epic Fragments, Quintus Smyrnaeus, Anacreon, Anacreontea, Stesichorus, Ibycus, Simonides etc. plus all the philosophers you didn't mention.

[Anonymous No.19740668]

>>19736370
aahahahahahahahah
get a load of this guy cam

[Anonymous No.19740678]

>>19736370
>i must filter all art through the lens of capeshit in order to make a judgement on it

[Anonymous No.19740751]

>>19731895
Wonderful sentiment, anon

[Anonymous No.19740759]

>>19740609
>who is Lucretius, who is Apuleius, who is Petronius, wait, they're not on the main shelf of Wallmart's book section, must be rubbish
rent free fat nigger

[Anonymous No.19740763]

>>19738639
>The Aeneid is better than the Iliad
Delusional

[Anonymous No.19741025]

>>19740591
Massive cope. Rome obviously had a big impact on those cultures but no one except some brain dead internet larpers seriously Identifies as a Roman. Greeks meanwhile have and actual nation state.
>Catholic Church
An ineffectual dying institution that only controls old ladies and Africans

[Anonymous No.19741132]

>>19740678
>something something want to have sex with spiders

[Anonymous No.19741264]

>>19740763
It actually is. Cope.

[Anonymous No.19741921]

>>19731895
Based