Some of our Great Books Students in 2010
Below you will find the four year reading list for our Great Books Program for the academic year 2011-2012, beginning with the Greek year of the program. In addition to the readings and two-hour discussions each week, the students write essay papers which are evaluated, marked, and returned to them. For students on our regular track the papers are generally about 800 words in length and there are two assigned each semester. Our college track students write one 1500 word essay each semester in addition to weekly writing assignments pertaining to each week’s reading. Reading and discussing great works is tremendously helpful to students in the development of their ability to speak well.
Please note in the lists below that some of the selections are marked with an asterisk. We read selections from those texts rather than the entire work.
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YEAR 1 - 2011/12 Great Books Program
First Year – The Ancient Greeks
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| Week |
First Semester |
| NOTA BENE: |
Reading before the second class:Theogony - Hesiod;Prometheus Bound -Aeschylus |
| 1 |
Orientation: Intro to the Great Books & Socratic Discussion.The Great Conversation, Adler |
| 2 |
Theogony - Hesiod
Prometheus Bound -Aeschylus |
| 3 |
The Iliad - Homer |
| 4 |
The Iliad - Homer |
| 5 |
The Odyssey - Homer |
| 6 |
The Odyssey - Homer |
| 7 |
Agamemnon, Libation Bearers - AeschylusEumenides – Aeschylus |
| 8 |
Trojan Women, Alcestis – Euripedes |
| 9 |
Aesop’s Fables -Aesop |
| 10 |
Oedipus Rex, Oedipus at Colonus -Sophocles |
| 11 |
Antigone – Sophocles, Hippolytus - Euripides |
| 12 |
Histories* – Herodotus |
| 13 |
Thanksgiving week -classes will be held on Wed. No classes on Thurs. and Friday |
| 14 |
Histories* - Herodotus |
| 15 |
Histories* - Herodotus |
| 16 |
Lycurgus, Solon, Pericles, Alcibiades -Plutarch |
| 17. |
Oral Exams(December 12 – 23) |
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| Week |
Second Semester |
| 17 |
Medea, Bacchae -Euripedes |
| 18 |
Peloponnesian War* -Thucydides |
| 19 |
Peloponnesian War *Thucydides |
| 20 |
Fragments* - Presocratic Philosophers |
| 21 |
Ion, Meno – Plato |
| 22 |
Gorgias – Plato |
| 23 |
Republic - Plato |
| 24 |
Symposium - Plato |
| 25 |
Apology, Euthyphro -Plato |
| 26 |
Crito, Phaedo – Plato |
| 27 |
Poetics, On the Heavens*,On the Soul* - Aristotle |
| 28 |
Spring Break, Apr. 2 – 6 |
| 29 |
Spring Break, Apr. 9 – 13 |
| 30 |
Ethics*, Metaphysics* -Aristotle |
| 31 |
Aristides, Alexander -Plutarch |
| 32 |
The Oath, On Ancient Medicine, On Airs, Waters, Places - Hippocrates |
| 33 |
Elements, Euclid |
| 34 |
Oral Exams (May 14-31) |
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*Selections Only |
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YEAR 2 - 2011/12 Great Books Program
Second Year – Roman Readings
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| Week |
First Semester |
| 1 |
Aeneid - Virgil |
| 2 |
Aeneid - Virgil |
| 3 |
Livy* |
| 4 |
Livy* |
| 5 |
Plutarch: Romulus, Numa Pomulus, Coriolanus, Caesar |
| 6 |
Conquest of Gaul -Caesar |
| 7 |
Plutarch: Cato the Younger, Antony, Brutus, Cicero |
| 8 |
On Friendship – Cicero |
| 9 |
On Duties – Cicero |
| 10 |
Annals* - Tacitus |
| 11 |
On the Nature of Things* – Lucretius |
| 12 |
Discourses*- Epictitus; Meditations* – Marcus Aurelius |
| 13 |
Almagest - Ptolemy |
| 14 |
On the Natural Faculties - Galen |
| 15 |
Enneads* – Plotinus |
| 16 |
Oral exams – Dec. 12 -23 |
*Selections Only |
| Week |
Second Semester |
| 17 |
Old Testament -Genesis |
| 18 |
New Testament* |
| 19 |
Apocalypse (Book of
Revelation)- John |
| 20 |
Confessions - Augustine |
| 21 |
Confessions - Augustine |
| 22 |
Consolation of Philosophy – Boethius |
| 23 |
Qu’ran*; Muhammed |
| 24 |
Two Lives of Charlemagne |
| 25 |
History of the English People - Bede |
| 26 |
Sir Galahad - TennysonSir Gawain and the Green Knight |
| 27 |
Memoirs of the Crusades; Crusade of St. Louis - Al-Makrisi |
| 28 |
Spring Break, Apr. 2 – 6 |
| 29 |
Spring Break Apr. 9 – 13 |
| 30 |
Song of Roland |
| 31 |
The Divine Comedy- Dante |
| 32 |
The Divine Comedy – Dante |
| 33 |
The Divine Comedy- Dante |
| 34 |
Oral Exams (May 14-31) |
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YEAR 3 - 2011/12 Great Books Program
Third Year – Medieval Readings
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| Week |
First Semester |
| 1 |
Canterbury Tales -Chaucer |
| 2 |
Canterbury Tales -Chaucer |
| 3 |
Aquinas* |
| 4 |
Aquinas* |
| 5 |
Aquinas* |
| 6 |
Aquinas* |
| 7 |
Aquinas* |
| 8 |
The Prince -Machiavelli |
| 9 |
Utopia - Sir Thomas More |
| 10 |
Praise of Folly- Erasmus |
| 11 |
On the Revolutions of the Heavenly Spheres*- Copernicus |
| 12 |
Institutes of the Christian Relgion* -Calvin |
| 13 |
Essays* - Montaigne |
| 14 |
Don Quixote* -Cervantes |
| 15 |
Don Quixote* -Cervantes |
| 16 |
Oral Exams – (Dec.12 – 23) |
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*Selections Only |
| Week |
Second Semester |
| 17 |
Comedy of Errors, Shakespeare |
| 18 |
A Midsummer’s Night’s Dream; Shakespeare |
| 19 |
The Taming of the Shrew -William Shakespeare |
| 20 |
Coriolanus - Shakespeare |
| 21 |
Julius Caesar -Shakespeare |
| 22 |
Dialogues Concerning Two New Sciences* - Galileo |
| 23 |
The Merchant of Venice - Shakespeare |
| 24 |
Henry V - Shakespeare |
| 25 |
The New Atlantis and Novum Organum* - Bacon |
| 26 |
Rules for the Direction of the Mind*, Discourse on Method*, Meditations-Descartes |
| 27 |
Leviathan* - Hobbes |
| 28 |
Spring Break, Apr. 2 – 6 |
| 29 |
Spring Break, Apr. 9 – 13 |
| 30 |
Paradise Lost - Milton |
| 31 |
Paradise Lost - Milton |
| 32 |
Pensees* - Pascal (May 64 |
| 33 |
Romeo & Juliet - Wm. Shakespeare |
| 34 |
Oral Exams – (May 14-31) |
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YEAR 4 - 2011/12 Great Books Program
Fourth Year – Modern Readings
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| Week |
First Semester |
| 1 |
Hamlet - Wm. Shakespeare |
| 2 |
Othello - William Shakespeare |
| 3 |
MacBeth - William Shakespeare |
| 4 |
King Lear - William Shakespeare |
| 5 |
The Tempest -William Shakespeare |
| 6 |
Tartuffe - Moliere;Phaedra, Racine |
| 7 |
Gulliver’s Travels - Jonathan Swift |
| 8 |
Essay Concerning Human Knowledge*, Second Essay on Civil Government*, Letter on Toleration* -John Locke ( |
| 9 |
Essay Concerning Human Knowledge*, Second Essay on Civil Government*, Letter on Toleration* - John Locke |
| 10 |
An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding*, Treatise of Human Nature*, Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion* - David Hume |
| 11 |
The Social Contract*, On the Origin of Inequality* - Jean-Jacques Rousseau |
| 12 |
The Federalist Papers*; – Q 105, Art. 1 – Aquinas |
| 13 |
U.S. Declaration of Independence, Articles of Confederation, & Constitution |
| 14 |
Democracy in America*, - De Tocqueville;Representative Government*, J.S, Mill |
| 15 |
Emma - Jane Austen |
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Oral Exams (Dec. 12 – 23) |
*Selections Only |
| Week |
Second Semester |
| 17 |
Critique of Pure Reason*, Fundamental Principles of the Metaphysics of Morals*- Immanuel Kant |
| 18 |
Faust - Goethe |
| 19 |
Philosophy of Right*, The Philosophy of History* -Georg Hegel |
| 20 |
War and Peace* - Tolstoy |
| 21 |
War and Peace - Tolstoy |
| 22 |
The Brothers Karamazov -Fyodor Mikailovich Dostoevsky |
| 23 |
The Brothers Karamazov -Fyodor Mikailovich Dostoevsky |
| 24 |
Wealth of Nations* - Adam Smith; Communist Manifesto - Karl Marx |
| 25 |
1st & 2nd Inaugural Addresses, Gettysburg Address; Emancipation Proclamation - Abraham Lincoln |
| 26 |
Walden, Civil Disobedience- Henry David Thoreau |
| 27 |
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn - Mark Twain |
| 28 |
Spring Break, Apr. 2- 6 |
| 29 |
Spring Break, Apr. 9 – 13 |
| 30 |
The Origin of Species* -Charles Darwin |
| 31 |
Nineteen Eighty Four -George Orwell |
| 32 |
Relativity: The Special and General Theory - Einstein |
| 33 |
My Antonia - Willa Cather |
| 34 |
Oral Exams (May 14 – 29) |
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