Greek to Me

Adventures of the Comma Queen

De: Mary Norris

Narrado por: Mary Norris

The Comma Queen returns with a buoyant book about language, love, and the wine-dark sea.

In her New York Times best seller Between You & Me, Mary Norris delighted listeners with her irreverent tales of pencils and punctuation in The New Yorker’s celebrated copy department. In Greek to Me, she delivers another wise and funny paean to the art of self-expression, this time filtered through her greatest passion: all things Greek.

Greek to Me is a charming account of Norris’s lifelong love affair with words and her solo adventures in the land of olive trees and ouzo. Along the way, Norris explains how the alphabet originated in Greece, makes the case for Athena as a feminist icon, goes searching for the fabled Baths of Aphrodite, and reveals the surprising ways Greek helped form English. Filled with Norris’s memorable encounters with Greek words, Greek gods, Greek wine - and more than a few Greek men - Greek to Me is the Comma Queen’s fresh take on Greece and the exotic yet strangely familiar language that so deeply influences our own.

©2019 Mary Norris (P)2019 Recorded Books

Wonderful romp through current and historic Greece

Ms. Norris is an engaging author with a well-honed, friendly tone. This is a great book to read to familiarize yourself with Greece before or after traveling there, or for anyone who loves the Greek culture and people.

Delightful

I personally loved that the author narrated in her own voice, you can almost hear the twinkle in her eye. I loved her humor, candor, and authenticity. Loved her travel stories and her passion for the language. I found it delightfully nerdy and engrossing!

Weaver of memories

Dear Athena,

Some things I liked about this book, include:

The voice of Mary Norris. What a like able person!

Her love of the Greek language and culture

Introduction to Patrick Leigh Fermor - his books now added to my reading list.

She doesn’t try to “pretty up” her experience of traveling alone as a woman in Greece.

I love Greek tragedy and very few people I know care for it or know what it is. The fact the she joined a Greek theater group - and played Hecuba at that! - makes her seem like a friend.

I just went out and bought two bottles of Greek wine and two Greek cookbooks. I’m going in!

Mary Norris is my grandmother’s name but I don’t think we are related.

Never heard of the Nashville Parthenon but now I may have to go.

Yours truly,

Hestia

Love her writing.

This is my second Mary Norris book I love her interesting storytelling and tidbits of knowledge on the history and language of Greek. Between You and Me and Greek to Me she tells a story with humor and knowledge enriching the language.

A love affair with a 3,200 year old culture

This Book is a paean to the geography, culture, history, mythology, cuisine and language (Classical, koine and modern) of Greece. A joyous listen.

Delightful listen

Excellent writing and brief stories sharing snapshots of travel in modern Greece. I loved the way the Greek language was woven into the stories. Very enjoyable.

Love!

It’s so refreshing to hear of the pursuit of knowledge simply for the enjoyment of that pursuit, especially when it takes place in Greece and under blue waters. I loved Mary’s first book. I was enthralled by this second (and so glad to know I’m not the only female with a thing for this subject). And it’s not just Greek wordy stuff, Mary goes surprisingly Deep in a good number of places. Plus, she narrated it, and that was wonderful. I feel like I got the female version of Windex Papa in My Big Fat Greek Wedding, sans the funny wedding story. Kudos! (Is that Greek?) Happy travels, give us more!

Beautiful, eloquent, textural writing

I love the thick descriptions of Greek idiosyncrasies. The culture, the language, the ancient history come to live through Mary’s adventures. She’s on her very own Odyssey, determined to soak up and master as much ‘Greekness’ as possible.

Tidbits of interesting narrative

If you tend to like academics or word study, you might find this book worthwhile. The narrator’s attempts to learn Greek through story and immersion are retold, with a few comical anecdotes. Self-narration does not help rating as her voice is not typical for an audible reader.

Potential Joy

We entered this with a sense of hope - perhaps a mixture of MAry Beard and Robert Fitzgerald but there were only few moments of beauty and very few 'AHA' pages. There is meat to why people study Greek and who people immerse in Greece but the passion of Nagy and Nicholson was not there.