Fr. Foster, Great Latin Language Teacher

“Latin is a dead language
as dead as dead can be…..
Once it killed the Romans,
and NOW it’s killing me!  

Did you ever recite this?  

As high school freshmen, we would chant these words to each other as we entered and exited Latin class.   

Did you study Latin at some point in your life?  

Amo, amas, amat… Do you still remember the Latin verb conjugations? or what about…  

Hic, Haec, Hoc… can you decline it?  

And Caesar’s Wars?  Ugh!  

Studying Latin in high school was an obligation – but – it was irksome! “Once it killed the Romans – and NOW it’s killing me….” These words frequently echoed in my head.  

Years laters, arriving in Rome from Pakistan, I was registering for theological studies at the Gregorian University; however, Latin and New Testment Greek  were required subjects starting from the first year. I wanted, at all costs, to avoid doing another course in Latin. The killing effects of high school Latin were still with me.  

The Dean of Theology, Fr. Jared Wicks,  informed me that if I passed the required test of Latin knowledge, I would be exempt from taking the Latin class. Before the date for the exam I studied day and night for weeks, reviewing and trying to revive my memory cells of the bitter Latin language.  

When the Dean informed me that I had passed the test, I was delighted. No mind-draining, demoralizing Latin course for me, I thought. However, Fr. Wicks’ concluding words stayed with me and picqued my curosity: “If you want to really teach,” he advized, “take Reginald Foster’s Latin course. If nothing else, to learn from him how to teach.”   

Three years later, I finally had an opening in my schedule that would allow the twice-weekly classes. However, during those three years, I had met “Reggie” as his students called him. You couldn’t miss him at the University. Clad in a simple blue plumber-looking shirt, jacket and trousers, bald head, rowdy face and frameless eyeglasses, Fr. Foster, who worked at the Vatican’s Latin Office, would arrive before 2 pm and go up to his classroom on the second floor. I would hear his 70 plus students, excitedly talking about their Latin class. Interestingly, none of them had that “Latin is killing me” attitude…. I was intrigued. Who could make Caesar and Cicero palatable?  

“No dead wood!” Foster’s voice boomed on the first day of the basic class which Foster called, The First Experience. “I don’t want you here if you don’t want to learn Latin. Got it!” There was silence in the class. He had a contract for each of us to sign that we would attend the twice-weekly classes and do the homework after each class. He would personally correct each of the legal-sized, single spaced “Ludi” that he freshly created for each class. “I will know AND you will know – if you know Latin. Got it!”  

Before the whining excuses could surface and be voiced of how hard Latin was, Foster informed us: “Friends, even the prostitutes and bums in Rome knew Latin. Got it!”  

The question was not “why study Latin”, but rather, “why didn’t people want to study Latin”. “If you don’t know Latin, you know nothing!” his growling voice echoed off the walls of the large classroom,  

“If you don’t know Latin, you are sitting out there on the sidelines – don’t worry, most of the world is out there with you. But if you want to know what’s going on in this whole stream of two thousand years’ worth of gorgeous literature than you need Latin.”  

Then we got a 10-paged, stapled, legal sized booklet of sheets. These sheets filled with samples of Latin from the writings of such greats as Horace, Ovid, Cicero, Augustine, Acquinas, Eramus, all the way down to the most recent papal document… “This is our textbook.” Foster announced. This booklet, a good Latin dictionary, along with the class explanations and Ludi were our means to learn one of the “killer” languages!  (To my surprise, in the booklet there was not a quote from Caesar’s Wars! ).  

The Dean was right! Reginald Foster, originally fromWisconsin, had a unique way of teaching. And not only did we study the text, but Foster organized day-long trips within Rome and to areas around Rome. The ancient voices in the texts took on new meaning as we visited places such as, the Roman Formum & Palatine, Ostia Antica; Castel Gondalfo; Arpina, Cicero’s birth place, and Formia where he had a home and is buried; Horace’s summer villa in the Sabinan hills; the ancient ruined castle of Aquino north of Naples and down on the plains the ancient mediavel town of Fossanova. Each trip had a picnic atmosphere about it; we were given a new booklet with the ancient Latin texts that dealt with the area or author,  read and sang in Latin, walked and shared with other class members and then finished the day’s outing in a local pizza restaurant.  Then there was the annual Ides of March tour where we followed in the footsteps of Julius Caesar on that fateful day….  

Here is a video of the song sang to Caesar at the end of the Ides of March tour. (The tour was also given during the Aestiva Romae Latinatis as in this video:  

Reginald Foster’s passion and love for his subject, his care and concern for each of his students, his joy of life totally changed my whole outlook on Latin, learning and teaching. His:  

• command of the material
• well-planned out lessons
• clear rules and guidelines
• passionate commitment to his subject
• engaging of all the internal and external senses in learning
• selfless dedication to his students and their progress

These qualites continue to be an example and inspiration to me of a great language teacher. Reginald Foster turned Latin from a dead to a living and life-giving language.  

And you, do you remember any language teacher or teacher who inspired you in your life?How did they help you to appreciate the subject you were studying better? What did you learn from them that you would like to pass on to other teachers?  

Eileen