“To read is an act of creation in which no one can do our work for us.” —Proust

Please visit the Online Class Schedule to view the Academic Calendar and specific dates. 

Great Books of the Ancient Greeks I
First Semester
Great Books of the Ancient Greeks II
Second Semester
Weekly Readings Weekly Readings
Before the first class read the article The Great Conversation, Theogony by Hesiod and Prometheus Bound by Aeschylus (we will send you links to these).
Week 1
Hour 1: Intro to the Great Books
& Socratic Discussion, and
The Great Conversation article  by Robert Hutchins and/or Mortimer AdlerHour 2Theogony – Hesiod;
Prometheus Bound – Aeschylus
Week 18
Peloponnesian War*  -Thucydides
Week 2
The Iliad – Homer
Week 19
Peloponnesian War*  -Thucydides
Week 3
The Iliad – Homer
Week 20
Fragments* – Presocratic Philosophers
Week 4
The Odyssey – Homer
Week 21
Ion, Meno – Plato
Week 5
The Odyssey – Homer
Week 22
Gorgias – Plato
Week 6
Agamemnon, Libation Bearers,
Eumenides – Aeschylus
Week 23
Republic* – Plato
Week 7
Trojan Women, Alcestis – Euripedes
Week 24
Republic* – Plato
Week 8
Aesop’s Fables* –Aesop
Week 25
Symposium – Plato
Week 9
Oedipus Rex, Oedipus at Colonus –Sophocles
Week 26
Apology, Euthyphro – Plato
Week 10
Antigone – Sophocles, Hippolytus – Euripides
Week 27
Crito, Phaedo – Plato
Week 11
Histories* – Herodotus 
Week 28
Poetics, On the Heavens*, On the Soul* – Aristotle
Week 12
Histories* – Herodotus 
Week 29
Ethics*Metaphysics* -Aristotle
Week 13
Thanksgiving week – No classes on Thurs. and Friday
Week 30
Spring Break
Week 14
Histories* – Herodotus
Week 31
Aristides, Alexander -Plutarch
Week 15
Lycurgus, Solon, Pericles, Alcibiades -Plutarch
Week 32
The Oath, On Ancient Medicine,
On Airs, Waters, Places –
 Hippocrates
Week 16
Medea, Bacchae – Euripedes
Week 33
Elements*, Euclid
Week 17
Oral Exams
Week 34
Oral Exams *Selections Only
Great Books of the Ancient Romans
First Semester
Great Books of the Ancient Romans to the Early Middle Ages
Second Semester
Weekly Readings Weekly Readings
Week 1
Aeneid – Virgil
Week 17
New Testament*
Week 2
Aeneid – Virgil
Week 18
Apocalypse (Book of Revelation)- St. John
Week 3
Livy*
Week 19
Confessions – Augustine
Week 4
Livy*
Week 20
Confessions – Augustine
Week 5
Plutarch: Romulus, Numa Pomulus,
Coriolanus, Caesar
Week 21
Consolation of Philosophy – Boethius
Week 6
Conquest of Gaul –Caesar
Week 22
City of God* – St.Augustine
Week 7
Plutarch: Cato the Younger, Antony, Brutus, Cicero
Week 23
City of God* – St.Augustine
Week 8
On FriendshipOn Duties – Cicero
Week 24
Qu’ran* – Muhammed
Week 9
Annals* – Tacitus
Week 25
History of the English People – Bede
Week 10
On the Nature of Things* – Lucretius
Week 26
Sir Galahad – Tennyson
Sir Gawain and the Green Knight
Week 11
Discourses*- Epictitus
Meditations* – Marcus Aurelius
Week 27
Memoirs of the Crusades; Crusade of St. Louis – Al-Makrisi
Week 12
Almagest  Ptolemy
Week 28
Imitation of Christ -Kempis
Week 13
On the Natural Faculties – Galen
Week 29
Spring Break
Week 14
Enneads* – Plotinus
Week 30
The Divine Comedy- Dante
Week 15
Old Testament –Genesis
Week 31
The Divine Comedy- Dante
Week 16
Oral exams
Week 32
The Divine Comedy- Dante
Week 33
Oral Exams*Selections Only
Great Books of the High Middle Ages to the Renaissance
First Semester
Great Books of the Renaissance to the Enlightenment
Second Semester
Weekly Readings Weekly Readings
Week 1
Canterbury Tales -Chaucer
Week 16
Don Quixote* – Ceravantes
Week 2
Canterbury Tales -Chaucer
Week 17
A Midsummer’s Night’s Dream;  Shakespeare
Week 3
Aquinas*
Week 18
The Taming of the Shrew -William Shakespeare
Week 4
Aquinas*
Week 19
Coriolanus – Shakespeare
Week 5
Aquinas*
Week 20
Autobiography of St. Teresa of Avila
Week 6
Aquinas*
Week 21
Julius Caesar – Shakespeare
Week 7
Aquinas*
Week 22
Othello – Shakespeare
Week 8
The Prince -Machiavelli
Week 23
The Merchant of Venice  – Shakespeare
Week 9
Utopia – Sir Thomas More
Week 24
Henry V – Shakespeare
Week 10
Praise of Folly Erasmus
Week 25
Rules for the Direction of the Mind*,
Discourse on Method*, Meditations-Descartes

Week 11
On the Revolutions of the Heavenly Spheres*– Copernicus
Week 26
The New Atlantis and Novum Organum* – Bacon 
Week 12
Institutes of the Christian Religion* -Calvin
Week 27
Leviathan* – Hobbes
Week 13
Essays*  Montaigne
Week 28
Spring Break – (April 15 – 19)
Week 14
Don Quixote* -Cervantes
Week 29
Paradise Lost – Milton
Week 15
Oral Exams
Week 30
Paradise Lost – Milton
Week 31
Pensees* – Pascal
Week 32
Romeo & Juliet – Shakespeare
Great Books of the Enlightenment to the Modern Era
First Semester
Great Books of the Modern Era
Second Semester
Weekly Readings Weekly Readings
Week 1
Hamlet – Shakespeare
Week 17
Emma – Jane Austen
Week 2
Macbeth – Shakespeare
Week 18
Critique of Pure Reason*
Fundamental Principles of the Metaphysics of Morals*
Immanuel Kant

Week 3
King Lear – Shakespeare
Week 19
Faust – Goethe
Week 4
Tartuffe – Moliere
Phaedra, Racine
Week 20
Philosophy of Right*
The Philosophy of History* -Georg Hegel

Week 5
The Tempest – Shakespeare
Week 21
War and Peace* – Tolstoy
Week 6
Gulliver’s Travels Jonathan Swift
Week 22
War and Peace* – Tolstoy
Week 7
Essay Concerning Human Knowledge*
Second Essay on Civil Government*
Letter on Toleration* –John Locke 
Week 23
The Brothers Karamazov –
Fyodor Mikailovich Dostoevsky
Week 8
Essay Concerning Human Knowledge*
Second Essay on Civil Government*
Letter on Toleration* –John Locke 
Week 24
The Brothers Karamazov –
Fyodor Mikailovich Dostoevsky

Week 9
Life of Samuel Johnson – Boswell
Week 25
Wealth of Nations* – Adam Smith
 Communist Manifesto 

Week 10
An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding*
Treatise of Human Nature*
Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion* – David Hume
Week 26
1st & 2nd Inaugural Addresses
Gettysburg Address
Emancipation Proclamation – Abraham Lincoln

Week 11
The Social Contract*
On the Origin of Inequality* – Jean-Jacques Rousseau
Week 27
Representative Government – Mills

Civil Disobedience – Henry David Thoreau

Week 12
U.S. Declaration of Independence
Articles of Confederation, & The Constitution
Week 28
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn – Mark Twain
Week 13
Thanksgiving week, no classes
Week 29
Spring Break (April 15 – 19)
Week 14
The Federalist Papers) – De Tocqueville
Week 30
The Origin of Species* – Charles Darwin
Week 15
Democracy in America*, – De Tocqueville
Representative Government*, J.S, Mill
Week 31

Nineteen Eighty Four -George Orwell

Week 16
Oral Exams (Dec. 12 – 23)
Week 32
Relativity: The Special and General Theory – Einstein
*Selections Only Week 33
My Antonia – Willa Cather