Hi Ho, Hi Ho

Within hours now a merry band of Latin & Classical Studies 3rd Formers will be hopping on a plane to Naples. We hope to send back pictures, updates and stories from our five days away but this will all be dependent on internet facilities in our accommodation...we'll see. In any case certainly on return there will be plenty of material to 'clog up'.

Thought for the week

This week, Marcus Aurelius returns to the theme of death:

'Death: a release from impressions of sense, from twitchings of appetite, from excursions of thought, and from service to the flesh.'

What an escape!

Antigone in Nifty Slideshow Format!

At Last! Antigone Pix

Well ladies and gents of the Clog world at last we have some visuals. And who better to feature first but il director himself. Indeed! The entire Antigone photo album will feature here tomorrow in a natty slideshow. And oh yeah, thanks for your patience!

T.Y. Book Reviews

Earlier this year our TY pupils were asked to choose from a selection of novels in the college library that were set in the classical world or simply took their inspiration from that world. Over the next few posts we will be including some their work starting today with the inaugural TY Classical Studies prize winner (not for this piece of work mind you), Ed Teggin's review of 'The Silver Pigs' by Lindsey Davies.

Rome, AD 71, Marcus Didius Falco is an Imperial agent to the newly installed Emperor Vespasian. Falco is a low ranking agent who is usually given demenial jobs such as cleaning up murder scenes. The start of the story is no exception as he is tasked with investigating the murder of a suspected conspirator, little does he know that dealing with this one case will entwine him in a full blown conspiracy to overthrow the Emperor Vespasian.The author, Lindsey Davies, starts off by introducing us to Falco and from the off there is an irony in that Falco describes himself as a republican and yet he finds himself in the service to the autocratic Emperor. Falco's talk of being a bit of a ladies' man lead s him to introduce Helena Justina, a senator's daughter with whom he once had a relationship with but even though he is still besotted with her, he tells himself that it would never work. Helena was once married to the obnoxious senator Pertinax who has just been found murdered in a prison cell as it seems that he too had dreams of a glorious coup against the Emperor and that maybe he would get to wear the royal of purple.The death of a senator in a fire at the temple of Heracles on the Aventine way leads to questions about a freedman called Barnabas who seems to be in someway beind these mysterious murders. In light of this, the Emperor orders Falco southwards in pursuit of this dangerous killer. Falco travels south in the company of his brother Petro and his family, masking his real motives as a family holiday. Falco investigates the surrounding area with the help of Helena Justina and dicovers that her father in law has designs on the throne. Now it is a race against time to prove his guilt before he can execute his plan.Shadows in Bronze is a fast moving murder mystery, set in Imperial Rome and is one of those intriguing books that you simply cannot bear to put down and it niggles at you until you eventually have to pick it up again and read on. I would gladly recommend this book to anybody as it has a good, interesting storyline which gives us an impression of what Imperial Rome was like.

Thought for the week

Marcus Aurelius contemplates death:

'Despise not death; smile, rather, at its coming; it is among the things that Nature wills. Like youth and age, like growth and maturity, like the advent of teeth, beard, and grey hairs, like begetting, pregnancy and childbirth, like every other natural process that life's seasons bring us, so is our dissolution.'

A difficult proposition...

Thought for the week

Marcus Aurelius advises us to to live for today:

'To live each day as though one's last, never flustered, never apathetic, never attitudinising - here is the perfection of character.'

Sensible advice indeed...