Customer Reviews

Reading Greek: Grammar and Exercises

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

This review is from the point of view of an adult self learner.

WHAT IT IS
This book is part of a three-book set, which includes:
1. Reading Greek: Text and Vocabulary
2. Reading Greek: Grammar and Exercises
3. An Independent Study Guide to Reading Greek

Think of the set as one book broken up into three parts, with the Greek practice text from every chapter in book #1, the grammar and exercises in every chapter in book #2, the answers to exercises in book #3. Nutty, but it works.

#1 Short passages of Greek text (with vocab lists at the end of each passage). Early passages are modern Dick-and-Jane "easy Greek" written especially to complement parallel sections of Grammar; later passages are simplified (and further on, not so simplified) passages from ancient texts.

#2 Grammar theory, forms, and exercises all keyed to parallel passages in the Text. So when you study middle voice verbs in Grammar, you read the accompanying passage in Text, and see how that form works in real Greek sentences.

#3 A. Translations of Text #1.
B. Answers to exercises in Grammar #2.
C. Hints and insights.

WHICH TO BUY?
This is an integrated set whose whole is much greater than the sum of the parts. You will want all three books. The TEXT complements the grammar, the GRAMMAR makes much much more sense when supported by the text readings. The answers to exercise in the STUDY GUIDE will show you stuff you missed learning--but you won't find that out unless you have book #3 to check your answers.

[There are other JACT RG books with short Greek passages from ancient texts. You don't need them now (or ever, IMHO Loebs are better).]

BAD STUFF
1. In my experience this is NOT a good set for absolute newbies. It was originally designed in the 1970s when students started Greek after a year of Latin, and thus already understood inflected grammars. If you don't understand inflected grammars already, you may get lost. I did. I tried (the old version) of RG as my first learn-Greek-on-your-own book about 18 months ago, and was immediately lost.

I'd suggest starting with Dobson's Learn New Testament Greek, them moving on to RG.

2. Vocabulary selection is excellent, Attic prose wise, but you're forced to make your own flip cards or memorization list. Because Greek diacriticals are a bitch, making your own computerized flip cards is a major pain. In the internet age, JACT really should have vocab flip cards at their web site.

3. Ancient Greek is still hard.

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GOOD STUFF
Since giving up on RG the first time I've been through Dobson's Learn NT Greek and memorized the forms in Mounce's Basics of Biblical Greek Grammar. Now that I've come back to RG it makes much much more sense, and it seems to me the most excellent book.

1. Simple Readings Cement Forms.
After memorizing all the verb forms in Mounce, I found struggling with Greek text a frustration--passing each word through a memorized translation table. RG's solution is to teach your brain to bypass the form tables and recognize word endings-meanings directly. The reading for the Present Tense chapter is full of simple sentences like: "Dikaiopolis walks on the ship." "Then the captain walks on the ship." and "The sailors walk on the ship." - different word endings in each case. Over and over. Repetition, particularly repetition in the context of a memorable little story, cements recognition. (Of course you do still have to memorize the forms.)

This is a whole additional layer of learning that you simply will not get from table-Greek books like Mounce, or tables-and-rules books like Mastronarde's Introduction to Attic Greek.

2. Sentence Structure.
It's not obvious till you've struggled a while, but ancient Greek has a layer of complexity on top of the alphabet and words. English brains extract word function--subject, verb, direct object--from word order; Greek brains extracted subject, verb, direct object from word endings; Greek sentences used word-order for other purposes. You've got to train you brain to process sentences a whole different way. Again, practice is the key. An RG has lots and lots and lots of text to help.

By the time I was through RG chapter 7, I could pick up Loeb's Xenophon's Anabasis and quickly recognize (via case endings) the structure of each sentence (though of course my vocab still wasn't up to an unassisted reading). This was very exciting.

Again, this is a whole additional layer of learning that you will not get from table-Greek books like Mounce, or tables-and-rules books like Mastronarde .

3. Learn By Reading; Lots Of Readings.
RG is not a tables-and-rules book with an expanded Examples section. It is an integrated system of teaching ancient Greek through a graded series of long and progressively complex reading passages. Again, a whole additional layer of learning that you will not get from Mounce or Mastronarde .

4. Attention To Detail
Someone spent a long time getting the big stuff and the little stuff right.
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COMPARING 2008 WITH EARLIER EDITIONS
1. The books are physically bigger, better laid out, with larger type and better fonts--much easier to read. A small thing that makes a big difference.

2. The Grammar has been entirely redone, and is much much better.

3. The Text readings are the same.

4. The vocabulary has been moved from Grammar to Text, which makes the readings much easier. (In the old version you were constantly flipping book to book.)
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COMPARED WITH ATHENAZE
Neither RG or Athenaze is perfect, but the both have lots of simple readings that I find most helpful. I've bought and used both, and would again.

1. Athenaze also has very good readings.

2. Athenaze is slower, with less complex early readings. Athenaze translations are also in a separate, 2d book.

3. Athenaze has NO ANSWERS TO EXERCISES. The current 2003 edition of the Athenaze main text has exercises, but the workbook with the exercise answers was created but apparently never released. For me this is the TIE BREAKER. RGs exercises are very hard, but very useful. If you ace the exercises, you understood the material. If you didn't you didn't.

Reading the other reviews, and one of them was clearly an excellent comprehensive review, I still felt a need to put in my opinion. I just loved the Reader in this series. It has been a lot of years since I studied Greek, but from the day I bought the grammar and reader, I just felt so enthusiastic about the entire process.

I recall going home and sounding out the words and working out the translation of the first readings, even before the first class. Everything was crystal clear. It is true I had studied Latin before, and that did give me some framework on which to hang the Greek grammar. I always figured it would be much harder for students who hadn't had that advantage. Having said that, our excellent prof took a week and explained some fundamental concepts (inflected grammar, etc), and we did just fine.

But the point about this specific book I'd like to make is that the structured learning via the readings just made the grammar so much more tolerable than it might otherwise have been. I LOVED the readings, and after completing each one, could hardly wait to start the next. Conversely, I recall one Latin class I took where we spent an entire semester doing nothing but grammar exercises and translating sentences from Latin to English. The exercise sentences had no relationship to each other. Nothing related to anything else. I might as well have been studying math for all the pleasure it gave me... This Greek reader is the opposite of that experience -- it is engaging and teaches very effectively.

I recommend this book, and the grammar text that goes with it, wholeheartedly. I have not seen the third text, and might just buy it for the fun of it.

Learning the Greek of Plato and the Aristophanes, etc, is so rewarding in every way. I wish everyone could have the fine experience.

As a series, the Reading Greek series is a very good way to learn Greek and should work for most people. For me, however, I could not really learn the structure of the language through these books for some reason. I have not put my finger on it. I like massive dry text perhaps, so I actually put this series down and got the Mastronarde Attic book, which taught me how to translate, but was inadequate to teach me how to read. I then returned to the Reading Greek series and I am having a fun time learning how to READ Ancient Greek. I would give this 4 stars on this.

The Kindle edition has issues, the biggest one is that there are MISSING CHARACTERS in some of the words. That pretty much defeats the purpose of learning Greek from this. Then there's the lower case gammas that are displayed as upper case upsilons. That one I can work around, but it's still wrong. The missing characters is a show stopper. I have tried to use this, but it is not working out well and I have to second guess the text. I am writing the publisher so they can correct this. When you have missing letters in a book that relies on knowing each letter of every word, it gets a single star.

I was excited to get this series for kindle-only to find that the text (Part 1) is not on the kindle. What's the deal!? The grammar and exercises and the answer key are on the kindle but not the reading text?

This is a great book, but do not buy the kindle version. It is a complete mess, and unusable. Amazon has been told about the problems with this kindle book, but they keep on offering it for sale.

(This is my review for all three books in the old version of the course, which I hope people interested in the new version will find helpful)

I recently picked up my copy of the old edition of Reading Greek, and I love the course.
It dives right into reading Greek from the start, and it gives quite lengthy readings. Which I think is an excellent. It means you have to work to get through the readings, but you will definitely pick up some Greek this way. If you're like me you'll find yourself picking up words everywhere, even ones they don't expect you to memorize from the reading.
The amount of vocabulary that they do expect you to memorize from each subsection is very manageable.

The grammar sections are clear and concise. I have not really studied an inflicted language and I still find myself able to grasp what's being explained.

The Independent Study Guide helps give answers to all of the exercises, and also helps explain the readings and grammar in greater detail. And it also gives the translations for said readings.

Overall, I find this an excellent course. I highly recommend self-learners to get all three books in the set though (Texts, Grammar and Study Guide), and also getting the companion book The World of Athens for some historical and cultural background (which is keyed to the texts in the Study guide) and audio cd Speaking Greek is recommended, but not necessary.

Highly regarded book, but not for self-study. Doesn't have the answers to any of the exercises anywhere in the book. What's more, the chapters are monstrously long. As if learning Greek weren't discouraging enough!

This book is very helpful for the New Testament Greek I'm trying to learn. Has basics things that for an old person like me & needed a refresher. Like it very much. Use it every day. Of course, you must spend at least 2-3 hours every day to learn N.T. Greek.........

Will some public-spirited & knowledgeable person please review this new edition of RG? I have no idea whether I should buy this expensive new set (with the reader) or "An Idependent Study Guide to Reading Greek". What are the pros & cons? And is it really any better than the 1st edition of RG?? Thanks!

I have not purchased this book, but after reviewing the table of contents and the other excerpts, the content appears to be the same as the 1st editions. I expect that errors in the 1st edition have been corrected and the look of the book has been improved. But I would not buy this if you are expecting a text radically different from the 1st ed. That being said, I have taught myself Ancient Greek using this text and the study guides. I like how JACT presents the material and would recommend it, regardless the edition.