Meta Description: Join Dr. David Noe and Dr. Jeff Winkle for a special “side dish” episode of Ad Navseam. Discover the tragic tale of the “Lost Episode” with Michael Fontaine, and dive deep into a definitive, hilarious, and rambling list of the top reasons to study the Latin language—from becoming a billionaire to curing misanthropy (or causing it).
Introduction: The Tragedy of the “Lost Episode”
Welcome back to the “Vomitorium,” listeners! We are glad you have joined us, though we must admit, the atmosphere in the bunker is a mix of high energy and deep perplexity.
In Episode 35, hosts Dr. David Noe and Dr. Jeff Winkle open the show with a confession that weighs heavy on their souls. There was a plan. There was a script. In fact, there was a recording of what Dr. Noe describes as a “fabulous” interview with the brilliant Dr. Michael Fontaine of Cornell University.
The topic? “How to Tell a Joke” in antiquity. It was a tour de force. Dr. Fontaine was “firing on all cylinders,” “snapping and popping left and right”. The conversation ranged from the comedies of Terence and Plautus to obscure political references involving Ronald Reagan and Donald Trump. It was destined to be an instant classic in the Ad Navseam canon.
But, as the old adage goes, “A funny thing happened on the way to the audio recording”. Due to some inexplicable technical “peccadillos” in the Vomitorium, the audio file was corrupted beyond redemption. Echoes, reverb, digital artifacts—it was a disaster. Even the heroic efforts of the show’s intrepid engineer, Mishka, could not salvage it. As Dr. Winkle sagely notes, “You cannot draw blood from a stone” (though Dr. Noe thought it was a turnip).
So, the Fontaine episode has been suppressed for the public good. But rather than leave a “big dull spot” in your week, the hosts sprang into action. The “Ad Navseam Spotlight”—essentially a Bat-Signal for classicists—lit up the clouds over Grand Rapids. Dr. Winkle jumped into his Honda Civic, Dr. Noe leaped into his Ford F-150, and they raced to the studio for an emergency recording session.
Dr. Winkle refuses to call this a full episode. He prefers the term “side dish”—a little gustatio to keep the palate cleansed while we wait for the main course to return.
Top Reasons to Study Latin & Greek (The “David Letterman” List)
To fill the void left by the lost interview, the hosts decided to dig deep into their own archives. They unearthed a promotional flyer they collaborated on six or seven years ago, designed to lure unsuspecting Calvin University students into the Classics major.
Modeled after David Letterman’s “Top 10” lists, this document lays out the definitive arguments for studying the classical languages. In true Ad Navseam fashion, they forgot to count down from ten to one, so the order is entirely arbitrary.
1. The Original Romance Language
“Latin is the original romance language. Without romance, the human species cannot be propagated.”
This is the kind of “dad joke” logic that defines the field. Dr. Noe recounts using this line on his Latin 102 students, specifically while discussing the word liber.
- Liber means “book.”
- Liber (with a short ‘i’) means “free” or “child” (as in liberi).
- Spanish has libro.
Dr. Noe jokingly told his class that “Spanish is Latin’s ugly daughter,” a remark that received muffled chuckles from behind the students’ masks. While he quickly retracts the insult (neither Spanish, French, nor Italian are actually ugly), the linguistic truth remains: Latin is the mother tongue. To know it is to know the DNA of half of Western Europe.
2. It’s All Greek to Me
“After studying classics, you will be able to say, ‘It’s Greek to me,’ except you’re referring to something you actually understand quite well.”
This famous idiom comes from William Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar. The character Casca is describing a speech given by Cicero. When asked what Cicero said, Casca replies that he couldn’t understand it because “it was Greek to me”.
Dr. Winkle notes that there is a “statute of limitations” on this joke. You can use it once at a cocktail party to sound clever. After that, you are just the annoying guy in the tweed jacket.
3. Medusa, Achilles, and Percy Jackson
“Three people who have never been in my kitchen.”
This cryptic heading is a deep-cut pop culture reference to the sitcom Cheers. Dr. Noe explains the lore: The character Cliff Clavin (played by John Ratzenberger, the voice of nearly every Pixar character) appeared on Jeopardy! In Final Jeopardy, Cliff’s answer was “Three people who have never been in my kitchen.” Cliff confidently wagered it all on that answer, only to lose spectacularly.
The point of the list item, however, is that mythological figures like Medusa and Achilles do become familiar guests in the mind of the classicist.
This leads to a discussion of Rick Riordan and the Percy Jackson phenomenon.
- Dr. Winkle: Admits he is “indifferent” to Percy Jackson and has never read the books, despite having 34 students in his Classical Literature course who are there solely because of Riordan.
- Dr. Noe: Admits to “envy.” He marvels at Riordan’s ability to contextualize ancient myths for a modern teenage audience and make a fortune doing it. “Why didn’t I think to do that?” he laments .
The hosts agree that while academics often sneer at popularizers, the field would be dead without them. Riordan, Disney’s Hercules, and Clash of the Titans are the “gateway drugs” that lead students to the hard stuff: Homer and Vergil.
4. The All-Access Pass
“The study of Greek and Latin is not just the study of language. It’s an all-access pass into a myriad of disciplines.”
Dr. Noe compares the Classics major to a “Disney World” pass. You slide your card into the reader, and you have access to everything:
- History: Thucydides and Livy.
- Comedy: Aristophanes and Plautus.
- Philosophy: Plato and Aristotle.
- Theology: The Church Fathers.
The Hosts’ Gateway Drugs:
- Dr. Noe: His entry point was John Calvin and John Milton. He realized he couldn’t understand the footnotes in Calvin’s Institutes or the references in Paradise Lost without knowing Latin, so he went back to the beginning (ab initio).
- Dr. Winkle: His entry point was the D’Aulaires’ Book of Greek Myths (received at age 7) and the 1981 film Clash of the Titans. He admits to being “obsessed” with mythology well into his teens, carrying that “nerdy” torch all the way to a PhD.
5. Medical School Moonlighting
“When you go to medical school… you can say to your patients, ‘Did you know that appendix is a Latin word? It means something extra that you don’t really need.'”
While advising medical students to moonlight as “appendectomists” for malt shop money might be legally dubious, the linguistic connection is real.
Dr. Noe shares a surreal anecdote: While in the delivery room for the birth of one of his children, the attending physician asked what he did for a living. When Noe sheepishly admitted, “I teach Latin,” the doctor’s eyes lit up. He immediately began quoting the Aeneid from memory.
Dr. Noe has had other experiences, including a home inspector who started reciting Julius Caesar’s Gallic Wars (Gallia est omnis divisa in partes tres) while checking the basement. It turns out, closet classicists are everywhere.
6. The Billionaire Stat
“People who study Greek and Latin are 35 times more likely to become billionaires.”
Okay, Dr. Winkle admits this one is a lie. But the real statistic is almost as good: Classics majors have a higher success rate getting into medical school than biology or microbiology majors. Why? Because they stand out. They are distinct. Dr. Noe advises students to consider a “double major”—keep the science, but add the humanities to become a well-rounded human being (and get the “all-access pass”).
7. Thanks to Alexander
“Thanks to Alexander’s eastward marauding, the New Testament was written in Greek.”
For those interested in theology, there is no substitute for the original languages. The New Testament isn’t just a religious text; it’s a Greco-Roman document. The Book of Acts references Castor and Pollux, Zeus, and Hermes, and even quotes the pagan poets Menander and Aratus.
The “Lost in Translation” Example:
Dr. Noe shares a specific example from his Greek class on Philippians 1.
- Paul uses the word eris (strife/discord—the name of the goddess).
- Later in the same verse, he uses eritheia (selfish ambition/party spirit).
- Jerome’s Latin Vulgate translates both words with the same Latin word: contentio.
Why? Was Jerome tired? Was he cranky from living in a cave? Without knowing Greek, you miss the nuance that Paul is distinguishing between general discord and specific, partisan political maneuvering.
Dr. Winkle adds the example of polutropos from the Odyssey. It means “much-turning” or “tossed about.” English translators have to choose one meaning (usually “cunning” or “man of many ways”), but the Greek holds all the meanings simultaneously.
8. Famous Classicists
If you study Latin, you join a club that includes some of history’s most fascinating figures.
- Christopher Lee: The actor who played Saruman and Count Dooku was a classicist. He was fluent in Latin and Greek and deeply read in the canon.
- George Orwell: Educated at Eton, Orwell had a tortured relationship with his classical training. He once made a list of Latin words to “purge” from English, yet he was deeply offended by an advertisement for “Woolsey Socks” that depicted a Greco-Roman god wearing underwear, calling it “blasphemous”.
- J.K. Rowling: Before she was a billionaire, she was a classics student. Her “squishy Latinese” spells are a testament to her training. Dr. Noe visited the coffee shop in Edinburgh where she wrote Harry Potter and learned she told the barista, “I’m going to be rich and famous someday”.
- Chris Martin: The lead singer of Coldplay was a classics major at University College London. (Dr. Noe refuses to acknowledge his music, as it was released after 1992).
- Karl Marx: Born on May 5th (the date of this recording), Marx wrote his Master’s thesis in Latin on the reign of Augustus (An Principatis Augusti…). He asked whether the Augustan age was a “happy time” for the Republic.
- James Garfield: The U.S. President was ambidextrous and multilingual. He could supposedly write Greek with one hand and Latin with the other at the same time. (Dr. Winkle speculates this freakish talent might be why he was shot, though that’s historically dubious).
- W.E.B. Du Bois: The first African American to earn a PhD from Harvard was a staunch advocate for classical education as a tool for liberation.
9. A Better Thinker (If Not a Better Human)
“The rigor of the classical languages will make you a better thinker… and make you a better human.”
Here, the hosts diverge.
- Dr. Noe: Admits he has become more “misanthropic” with age and no longer believes that education necessarily builds character. “I’m definitely headed in the other direction now,” he jokes (we think).
- Dr. Winkle: Agrees that it makes you a better thinker. He uses an analogy involving stuttering.
- Famous stutterers like Joe Biden, James Earl Jones, and country singer Mel Tillis often lose their stutter when they are acting or singing.
- Why? Because they are stepping into a “role”—stepping outside their own natural speech patterns.
- Latin does the same thing for your brain. It forces you to step outside of English, dismantle your thoughts, and reconstruct them in a foreign architecture. This “alien” perspective allows you to understand your own language and thought processes with a clarity that monolingual speakers simply cannot achieve.
Conclusion: Lego My Eggo
The episode winds down with a reflection on the weirdness of the list and the impromptu nature of the recording. But before they sign off, Dr. Noe delivers a Gustatory Parting Shot that rivals the wisdom of the ancients.
It comes from the annals of advertising history—specifically, the Kellogg’s corporation.
When trying to name their frozen waffles, the executives rejected “Flaffle my Waffle” and “Flan Cake my Pancake.” Instead, they gave the world:
“Lego my Eggo.”
A sentiment as timeless as Carpe Diem.
Sponsors & Merch:
- Hackett Publishing: Visit hackettpublishing.com and use code AN2021 for 20% off and free shipping. Support the publishers who keep the classics alive.
- Ratio Coffee: Visit ratiocoffee.com and use code ANCO for 15% off the Ratio 6. No brackish tang, just pure glory.
- Ad Astra Roasters: Visit adastraroasters.com and use code ANAA for 10% off. Coffee that takes you to the stars.
Don’t forget to visit Lurch with Merch for your “taking in the classics and keeping them down” t-shirts.
Valete!
