NEWS FLASH:
Pig Fight Breaks Out In Classics
From staff reports
Wooster, OH -- The Department Classics at The College of Wooster was
roiling in conflict yesterday over its first annual "This Little Piggy
Contest."
The competition, which opened several weeks ago, offers a tempting
prize for the best Latin or Greek interpretation of the immortal ditty,
“This Little Piggy Went To Market.” Although students were invited to
compete, members of the Classics faculty proved unable to restrain
themselves.
Professor Edith Foster submitted an entry entitled Lugete o Veneres
Cupidinesque/ Porcus Mortuus est Meae Puellae. ('Mourn, all ye Venuses
and Cupids! My girlfriend’s pig is dead!'). It is a porcine version of
a famous poem that Roman poet Catullus once wrote about a sparrow.
Professor Foster’s entry provoked an intense reaction from colleagues.
"What is this hendecasyllabic posturing?" Professor McGowan asked
disdainfully in an interview yesterday, adding, "Arma porcumque
cantabo." ('I will sing of arms and the pig!')
Experts agree that his answer, based on the opening line of Vergil’s
Aeneid, hints at a future riposte in dactylic hexameter. Since dactylic
hexameter uses twelve syllables, one more than the eleven syllables of
hendecasyllabic meter, McGowan’s entry would outweigh and outscore
Foster’s. In order to stay in the race she would be compelled to raise
the stakes, and might have to resort to ancient Greek to maintain her
lead.
Professor Rachel Sternberg, chair of the department, told a reporter
that the "This little Piggy Contest" had created an atmosphere of
expectation and concentration in the department.
"In ancient times tensions ran high when people were preparing for the
Olympics. Nowadays it’s just the same," she said. "Contestants gather
their physical and mental forces and sometimes behave in unpredictable
ways. Classical philologists are human, after all. They get nervous.
They struggle for acceptance, for recognition -- and, yes, even for
advantage."
The first prize in the contest is eternal fame and a stuffed pig.
"It is unusual, but not outside of the rules, for Foster to rush into
the fray here,” said Sternberg. “We’ll see what happens."
Sternberg cautioned, however, that her tolerance for “unpredictable"
behavior was not endless. “My colleagues need to remember the old Latin
adage: Porci erunt, qui porcos scribunt." ('They will be pigs who write
pigs.')
Experts say her remark implies that swinish behavior and swinish
writing will not be tolerated -- despite the topic of the contest.
The tensions in the department are all the more remarkable in that
Classics undergraduates had recently engineered a Halloween entente,
decorating the professors’ offices and creating a generally friendly
and joyous atmosphere late last month. Several students who declined to
be identified told reporters they were astonished at the sudden turn of
events.
"They should relax," said one senior. "It’s festina lente ('Make haste
slowly'), not just carpe diem ('seize the day')."
Foster herself declined to be interviewed. The contest will now be
closely watched, however, and future entries carefully scrutinized. The
deadline for entries is Nov. 23.
[NB: This news flash came from the inspired pen of Professor Edith
Foster.]