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Great Books
About this book
*NATIONAL BESTSELLER* " A lively adventure of the mind...The tone of the prose...is one of unqualified enthusiasm: energy, vigor, intellectual curiosity, and what might be called an ecstasy of imaginative journalism." — The New York Times Book Review At the age of forty-eight, writer and film critic David Denby returned to Columbia University and re-enrolled in two core courses in Western civilization to confront the literary and philosophical masterpieces -- the "great books" -- that are now at the heart of the culture wars. In Great Books, he leads us on a glorious tour, a rediscovery and celebration of such authors as Homer and Boccaccio, Locke and Nietzsche. Conrad and Woolf. The resulting personal odyssey is an engaging blend of self-discovery, cultural commentary, reporting, criticism, and autobiography -- an inspiration for anyone in love with the written word.
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Information
Index
Abel, 157, 300
Abraham, 11, 160, 182, 183
absolutism:
Hobbes’s belief in, 210–11, 289
Locke’s rejection of, 217, 289
moral, 251, 253, 254, 257, 258
Academy, the, 67, 118
Achebe, Chinua, 377, 409, 410, 416, 418–20, 424–28
achievement, as racial issue, 99
Achilles, 34, 37–39, 44–50, 107, 372
Aeneas compared with, 149
consciousness and, 49
as hero, 10, 37, 47–50
as infantile narcissist, 37, 45, 49
Adam, 33, 159, 180–81, 187–88
adultery, 66, 255, 262
in Iliad, 33–34
in Oresteia, 134
advertising, envy and, 214–15
Aeneas, 147–55, 241
dutiful temperament of, 149–50
in Iliad, 149
underworld visited by, 232–33, 414
Aeneid (Virgil), 146–55, 241, 414
Ascanius in, 149, 150, 153
Dido in, 147–53, 241
Hector in, 148
Iliad and, 147, 149, 152, 154
loss in, 146, 150–51, 153–54, 155
suffering in, 150–51, 153–54, 241
Aeschylus, 37, 108, 120, 132, 134–36
aesthetic values, in theory, 5
African-Americans, 42, 99, 257, 368
crime and, 206–8, 213–14
higher education debate and, 16, 17, 61, 89–91, 100, 105, 128–30, 267–68, 377–79, 461–63
literature of, 8
as victims, 66
white children’s imitating of, 105
see also specific students
After Theory (Eagleton), 5
Against the Current (Berlin), 200n
Agamemnon:
Aeneas compared with, 149
in Iliad, 33, 34, 48, 361
in Oresteia,...
Table of contents
- Cover
- Acknowledgments
- Dedication
- Epigraph
- Introduction to the Second Edition (2005)
- Introduction to the First Edition (1996)
- Reading Lists
- First Semester
- Second Semester
- Appendix: Earlier Reading Lists
- Selected Bibliography
- Index
- Copyright