Helen Schultz Returns for a Masterclass

Leave it to the Winsor community to have a full classroom on a sunny spring Saturday captivated and singing in Latin together.  

Returning to Winsor after retiring in 2016 as a Latin teacher, Helen Schultz held a master class in the Latin translation of “Adore Te Devote,” a hymn written by St. Thomas Aquinas in 1264. Aquinas was an Italian Dominican friar and priest, an influential philosopher and theologian. The hymn was written as a private prayer which was eventually added to catholic services for daily adoration of the blessed sacrament or Eucharist. 

Going line by line of the hymn, Schultz read the hymn in Latin and then translated the hymn to English for the class, which she explained could not be a direct translation. 

“English doesn’t have as much punch as Latin because Latin doesn’t have things like articles or helping verbs and so on. I think he did a really good job of capturing the sense and a lot of the music of Thomas Aquinas,” said Schultz, discussing one of the English translations of the hymn and how it is difficult to translate the hymn directly from Latin. 

“I told her to put it on youtube,” said Jane Rose ’64, who was singing Schultz praises after the class. For such a heady subject, Rose said Schultz had a way of making the topic entertaining, and she was impressed she had many in the class chanting along to the hymn after she finished translating it. 

Attendees had the option of choosing two other master classes during alumnae weekend which were designed as a way to bring past students back into the classroom. The other two masterclasses were Sing and Dance with LT (aka DancingMaestra) with former Performing Arts Faculty Lisa Taillacq, and a paper kite installation with Visual Arts Faculty Emily Valenza.