From Professor Dennis Wood Sir: I agree entirely with Harry
Mount — indeed, in my experience, one is far more likely to find good Latin being written on the Net than in most British Classics departments. The 'Grex Latine loquentium' email circle (www.grexlat.com) has been in existence for eight years. Latin is the only language permitted, and the club has nearly 300 members around the world, several of whom write the language on a daily basis and address the most diverse contemporary subjects: for example, the situation in Iraq or the new European constitution. Contrast this with the new policy of the Oxford Classical Texts series, which allows prefaces to be written in English; is this, one wonders, because classicists can no longer be found who can write Latin, or students who can read it? The Grex now seems to be almost the last bastion of living Latinity outside the Vatican.
Dennis Wood
University of Birmingham
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