On Tuesday 4 March, Bryanston had the honour of hosting the fifty-eighth annual Salisbury Classical Association Reading Competition. This event, which brought together students from ten different schools, of ages 10-18, was a real celebration of Classics. The main focus of the competition is the recitation and performance of passages of Latin or Greek, either from a script or from memory.
Bryanston welcomed pupils from Bryanston Prep, Port Regis, Sandroyd, Farleigh, Sherborne Prep, Dauntseys, Bishop Wordsworth’s, Leweston and St Mary’s Calne for the competition.
The difficulty and feel of the piece depended on the age group. Cowley saw a wonderful range of performances of Latin plays from the Cambridge Latin Course, delivered by the Prep School teams and judged by our own Mr Fowler-Watt and Dr Fearnley.
In Grosvenor, ex- Bryanston Head of Classics Mr Holland was tasked with judging the busy intermediate strand of the competition, which saw students from a plethora of different schools read short extracts from a variety of Latin poets, whilst the advanced categories were held in Lulworth. We had the pleasure of hosting Professor of Latin and Head of Faculty at Brasenose College, Oxford, Llewelyn Morgan, as judge of the latter, and he brought real expertise to his assessment of the various recitations of Latin and Greek that were delivered in this section.
Head of Classics Dr Pullan, commented: “Overall, the Bryanston team of 14, from years 7 to 13, did very well, winning four golds, two silvers and one bronze from nine categories entered, however the prizes were generally shared around amongst the schools that entered, and everyone went away happy, having experienced a wonderful celebration of the subject!”
