All Scholars

Ivan Linforth was one of the great Hellenists of his time. For over 40 years he taught the Greek language and literature to generations of students, several of whom became prominent classical scholars. He was an authority on Greek religion, in which his greatest contribution was his study of Orphism, The Arts of Orpheus, which challenged the prevailing scholarly view of that phenomenon and has had a salutary effect on later studies of the subject. In addition he made significant contributions to the study of Solon, Herodotus, Plato, and Sophocles.Deeply influenced by his Berkeley teacher Isaac Flagg, Linforth turned his chief interest to Greek, though his master's thesis and dissertation were both on Latin subjects. In his classes he emphasized the reading of the Greek text, teaching students to phrase Greek sentences correctly. He kept translation to a minimum, leaving it mostly to written exercises. He was an excellent instructor in all the intricacies of Greek syntax and word usage. He loved the ancient Greek language and conveyed his feeling for it to several generations of students. Following his retirement in 1949, he turned to Sophocles, on whom he published regularly for the next 12 years.