Uploaded January 2026 | Updated September 2026, 4 days ago
What would compel a classical scholar to leave one of the world’s most ancient and prestigious universities for a fledgling institution only just beginning to teach?
In this conversation, a senior classicist reflects on his decision to step away from Cambridge and join Ralston College—drawn not by novelty, but by first principles. He speaks candidly about the crisis of purpose in modern universities, the loss of deep reading, and the disappearance of shared intellectual life. Against this backdrop, he describes encountering something rare: a community built around immersion in language, place, and the great questions that have shaped human civilization.
From learning ancient Greek through speech in Greece itself, to reviving Latin in Italy by the same immersive method, this is an account of education taken seriously—slowly, demandingly, and with joy. It is also a meditation on why Greece, Greek, and the classical tradition remain indispensable to understanding who we are, and where we might yet go.
Ralston College exists to renew the humanities by returning ad fontes—to language, to place, and to the pursuit of truth in fellowship with others. This talk offers a glimpse of what that renewal can look like, and why it matters now more than ever.
What would compel a classical scholar to leave one of the world’s most ancient and prestigious universities for a fledgling institution only just beginning to teach?
In this conversation, a senior classicist reflects on his decision to step away from Cambridge and join Ralston College—drawn not by novelty, but by first principles. He speaks candidly about the crisis of purpose in modern universities, the loss of deep reading, and the disappearance of shared intellectual life. Against this backdrop, he describes encountering something rare: a community built around immersion in language, place, and the great questions that have shaped human civilization.
From learning ancient Greek through speech in Greece itself, to reviving Latin in Italy by the same immersive method, this is an account of education taken seriously—slowly, demandingly, and with joy. It is also a meditation on why Greece, Greek, and the classical tradition remain indispensable to understanding who we are, and where we might yet go.
Ralston College exists to renew the humanities by returning ad fontes—to language, to place, and to the pursuit of truth in fellowship with others. This talk offers a glimpse of what that renewal can look like, and why it matters now more than ever.
