“I don’t think any further courses could possibly improve your chances in the job market, Sara,” counseled Mrs. Holmes, head of the summer course. “With your speeds and educational background, you’re more than ready for an executive secretarial position. I suggest you start following up the want ads.”
Buoyed by this encouragement, Sara and Ted set about checking the newspapers. There seemed to be so many open ings in Cambridge that she could probably find something within walking distance of their apartment on Huron Avenue.
Her first two interviews resulted in firm offers and a real dilemma. The job with the vice-president of the Harvard Trust paid a lavish seventy-eight bucks a week, whereas the University Press had an opening with longer hours offering a mere fifty-five. Yet, it was clear which attracted both husband and wife.
First of all, the Press was closer (you could even slide there in a snowstorm). Secondly, it offered the possibility of advancement (“With your languages, you might move into copy editing fairly soon,” Mrs. Norton, the personnel director, had remarked when she saw Sara’s initial reaction to the proposed salary).
Perhaps the most attractive dimension, as they both realized, was that it could be a rich source of top-level information about the Classics world. They would be among the first to know who was writing a book on what, and whether it was going to be accepted or rejected. This sort of intelligence might prove invaluable at Ted’s job-seeking time.
Graduate school was much more rigorous than he had ever anticipated. To earn a Ph.D., you had to take some brutally difficult seminars in Linguistics, Comparative Grammar, Metrics, Greek and Latin Stylistics, and so forth. Fortunately, he was blessed with a nightly dinner partner with whom he could discuss such esoterica.
From as early as the summer they first lived together, Ted had always insisted on cooking the evening meals. But now, since he believed the chef should have his classical studying finished before entering the kitchen, Sara had the uncomfortable prospect of having to wait till nearly ten o’clock before her husband would begin to prepare their deipno (dinner).
This posed some delicate problems of diplomacy. For what sane woman could object to a delicious meal accompanied by choice Greek wine, served with music and soft candlelight by a highly professional waiter — who would then sit down and tell you how much he loved you. And after dinner would join you in bed.
How could a woman tell such a husband that, though the evenings were enchanted, the mornings after she could barely stay awake at her typewriter? Sara therefore concluded that the only way to solve this predicament was to learn the secrets of Lambros cuisine from Mama herself. This way, while Ted was still struggling with Indo-European etymologies, she could be starting dinner.
Thalassa Lambros was flattered by her daughter-in-law’s interest and did everything she could to accelerate her culinary education. This included detailed memos, which Sara diligently studied.
By January she was confident enough to arrogate the task of cooking dinner. And none too soon. For Ted would be facing a battery of language exams at the end of the spring semester.
The German requirement was killing him. Dammit, he had often thought, why does so much important classical scholarship have to be written in this preposterously difficult language? Here again, Sara, who had taken three years of German in school, was able to help him acquire a feeling for its periodic sentence structure. And by plowing through several articles with him, showed how he could intuit the general meaning of a passage from the classical citations in the text.
After one of these mini-tutorials, he looked at her with unadulterated affection and said, “Sara, where the hell would I be without you?”
“Oh, probably out seducing some attractive graduate student.”
“Don’t you even joke like that,” Ted whispered, reaching over to caress her.
With Sara’s help and encouragement, Ted successfully jumped all the examination hurdles and began a thesis on Sophocles. As a reward he was made a teaching fellow in Finley’s Humanities course.
He tossed and turned but still could not get back to sleep.
“Darling, what’s the matter?” Sara asked, placing her hand gently on his shoulder.
“I can’t help it, honey. I’m so damned scared about tomorrow.”
“Hey,” she said soothingly, “it’s understandable — the first class you’ve ever taught in your life. It would be unnatural if you weren’t nervous.”
“I’m not nervous,” he replied, “I’m absolutely catatonic.” He sat up on the side of the bed.
“But, darling,” she reasoned, “it’s only a Hum Two discussion. The kids will be more frightened than you. Can’t you remember your first freshman section?”
“Yeah, I guess. I was a scared little townie. But they say the damn undergraduates are getting smarter and smarter. And I keep having this ridiculous fantasy that some world-famous professor is going to decide to drop in unannounced tomorrow.”
Sara glanced at the alarm clock. It was nearly 5:00 A.M., and there was no point in trying to talk Ted into going back to sleep.
“Hey, why don’t I make some coffee and listen to what you plan to say? It could be a kind of dress rehearsal.”
“Okay,” he sighed, relieved to be liberated from the prison of his bed.
She quickly made two large mugs of Nescafé and they sat down at the kitchen table.
At seven-thirty she began to laugh.
“What the hell’s the matter? What did I do wrong?” Ted asked anxiously.
“You crazy Greek.” She smiled. “You’ve just talked brilliantly about Homer for nearly two hours. Now, since all you’ve got to do is kill fifty minutes, don’t you think you’re adequately prepared to confront your first freshmen?”
“Hey,” he smiled, “you’re some good psychologist.”
“Not really. I just happen to know my husband better than he knows himself.”
The date, the time, and the place of Ted’s first class are indelibly engraved in his memory. On Friday, September 28, 1959, at 10:01 A.M., he entered a discussion room in the Alston Burr Science Building. He unpacked a ridiculous number of books, all with carefully marked passages he could read aloud should he run out of ideas. At 10:05 he wrote his name and office hours on the blackboard and then turned to confront the students.
There were fourteen of them. Ten boys and four girls, their spiral notebooks open and pencils ready to transcribe his every syllable. Jesus, he suddenly thought, they’re going to write down what I say! Suppose I make some incredible mistake and one of the kids shows it to Finley? Worse still, suppose one of them with a million years of prep-school Classics catches me right here? Anyway, Lambros, it’s time to start.
He opened his yellow notepad to his meticulously outlined remarks, took a breath, and looked up. His heart was beating so loud that he half-wondered if they could hear it.
“Uh — just in case somebody thinks he’s in a physics class, let me start by saying that this is a Hum Two section and I’m your discussion leader. While I’m taking your names down, you can learn mine. I’ve written it on the board. It happens to be the Greek word for ‘brilliance,’ but I’ll leave you guys to make up your minds about that after a few weeks.”
There was a ripple of laughter. They seemed to like him. He began to warm to the task.
“This course deals with nothing less than the roots of all Western culture, and the two epics ascribed to Homer constitute the first masterpieces of Western literature. As we’ll see in the weeks to come, the Iliad is the first tragedy, the Odyssey our first comedy…”