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GREAT WORKS IN DIALOGUE: PROGRAM OVERVIEW
Creating a community of readers and thinkers through the exploration
of great ideas and issues
See course directory quarter by quarter
Join our exciting series of seminars, where people of all backgrounds
come together to read great texts of philosophy, religion, and literature
and discuss the enduring questions these texts examine. The texts
we study are timeless and timely; they explore the perennial questions
of human existence, but also have great relevance to contemporary
problems. These texts speak to us with a fresh voice; they change
our minds, move our hearts, and touch our spirits.
Each quarter of this two-year sequence will focus on three texts
in literature, philosophy, and/or religious thought, chosen both
for the intrinsic value of their ideas and for the models they present
of intellectual and cultural inquiry. The class format will be organized
around both short lectures and discussion. Your instructors will
begin discussion with short introductory lectures, delivered to
the two sections as a group. Afterward, we'll break into our two
smaller sections to discuss the work in depth.
By creating a sustained dialogue with these great works, we hope
to foster an environment in which you, as individuals and as a group,
can develop a clearer understanding of rich and profound pieces
of writing. Our goals will be
- to develop your abilities to read complex texts closely, deeply,
and comparatively;
- to heighten your sensitivity to the interrelationships among
our texts, as well as to their aesthetic and formal qualities;
- to help you understand some aspects of the historical and cultural
contexts that produced and celebrated our texts;
- and finally, to deepen your appreciation of the enduring influence
and importance of these works.
First Year (2002 - 2003)
Fall Quarter
Origins: The Torah (the Hebrew Bible); The Koran; Milton, Paradise
Lost
Winter Quarter
Epic Journeys: Homer, Odyssey; Vergil, Aeneid; Dante,
Inferno, and selections from Purgatorio and Paradiso
Spring Quarter
Transformations: Ovid, Metamorphoses; Shakespeare, The
Winter's Tale; Woolf, To the Lighthouse
Second Year (2003 - 2004)
Fall Quarter
The Self in Relationship: Chaucer, Canterbury Tales; Shakespeare,
King Lear; Mary Shelley, Frankenstein
Winter Quarter
Are You What You Read?: Augustine, Confessions; Flaubert,
Madame Bovary; Kingston, The Woman Warrior
Spring Quarter
Understanding Identity: Plato, Republic; Romantic Poets,
selections from Wordsworth, Coleridge, and Keats; Toni Morrison,
Beloved
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