A. D. Godley
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Alfred Denis Godley (1856--1925) was a classical scholar and author of humorous poems. From 1910 to 1920 he was Public Orator at the University of Oxford, a post that involved composing citations in Latin for the recipients of honorary degrees. One of these was for Thomas Hardy who received an Honorary D. Litt. in 1920, and whose treatment of rural themes Godley compared to Virgil.
He is mainly remembered today for his humorous verse, including macaronic pieces such as The Motor Bus which playfully mixes Latin declensions with English.
- What is this that roareth thus?
- Can it be a Motor Bus?
- Yes, the smell and hideous hum
- Indicant Motorem Bum!
- Implet in the Corn and High
- Terror me Motoris Bi:
- Bo Motori clamitabo
- Ne Motore caedar a Bo---
- Dative be or Ablative
- So thou only let us live:---
- Whither shall thy victims flee?
- Spare us, spare us, Motor Be!
- Thus I sang; and still anigh
- Came in hordes Motores Bi,
- Et complebat omne forum
- Copia Motorum Borum.
- How shall wretches live like us
- Cincti Bis Motoribus?
- Domine, defende nos
- Contra hos Motores Bos!
The poem is quoted by Dorothy L. Sayers in her well-known essay "The greatest single defect of my own Latin education".
Godley's published works include:
- Verses to Order (1892)
- Aspects of Modern Oxford (1894)
- Socrates and Athenian Society in His Day (1896)
- Lyra Frivola (1899)
- Second Strings (1902)
- Oxford in the Eighteenth Century (1908)
- The Casual Ward (1912)
- Reliquiae A. D. Godley (1926)
He also published a translations of Herodotus (1921) and Horace's Odes (1898).
Godley was a first cousin of the Under-Secretary of State for India John Arthur Godley, 1st Baron Kilbracken.
