Literature Index

Other Reading Here

First Term:

• start listening to Iliad
• Gilgamesh the Hero
  

Iliad
Book 1 (overview)
Book 2
Book 3
Book 4
Book 5
Book 6
Book 7
Book 8

Top Ten Quotes
Second Term
Read Odyssey

Book I [35k] Book II [36k] Book III [40k] Book IV [62k] Book V [39k] Book VI [31k] Book VII [31k] Book VIII [46k]

Book IX [46k] Book X [45k] Book XI [48k] Book XII [38k] Book XIII [36k] Book XIV [43k] Book XV [44k] Book XVI [38k]

Book XVII [47k] Book XVIII [36k] Book XIX [48k] Book XX [34k] Book XXI [36k] Book XXII [39k] Book XXIII [33k] Book XXIV [43k]

Third Term:

start reading Poetics.

Section 1 [44k]

Section 2 [41k]

Section 3 [44k]

Read Theban plays
Read Oresteian trilogy.


Read Plato's dialogues

Composition: Introduction continued

“Eloquence is picked up more readily by those who read and listen to the words of the eloquent than by those who follow the rules of eloquence. .....“They observe the rules because they are eloquent; they do not use them to become eloquent.” St Augustine.

The goal of composition is to be able to learn to express oneself well in writing. St Augustine calls this "eloquence" -- the ability to say well what you want to say -- and he points out here that reading good things is a better way to good writing than studying the rules. This is true of almost everything, by the way.

However, there is some value in learning the rules, just as there is value in learning routes in football so well that you do them automatically. It frees up your mind to get past the basics. Paddy has trouble writing because he doesn't know the rules of spelling yet. When he can spell, he will be able to write much more easily because he won't have to think about each letter in each word.

So this year we will be doing a combination of things for English:

1. Learning some writing strategies.
2. Practicing writing, focusing on different elements.
3. Reading good writing.

We're going to start with paragraphs rather than with sentences or whole essays -- this clip from an old book explains why.



This concludes Lesson 1.

Plans for the Course

This course will have four parts:

1. Literature and Reading
2. Composition
3. Grammar
4. Vocabulary

You don't have to follow any of these links -- this part is just for future reference.

Literature will be related to history. There will also be questions and readings connected with learning how to read and analyze different materials on a high school level. We will read: Aristotle's Poetics, Homer's Iliad, Homer's Odyssey, Sophocles' Theban Trilogy as well as some other Greek drama, and parts of two background books: How to Read a Book, and Tenets for Readers and Reviewers.




For composition, there will be regular assignments -- some short (one paragraph) and some longer (several paragraphs). A study of Logic will be connected with this. References: Elements of Style and the Progymnasmata. More detail: English Studies Part I and Part II


For grammar, this Daily Grammar site is useful for review and to fill in any gaps you might have in understanding. We'll probably also do some diagramming. Grammar will be three times a week.



For vocabulary, we have a workbook series that is fairly simple to use. Here's also Free Rice and ThatQuiz. and Quizlet. Vocabulary will be twice a week. Vocabulary will often be related to words that are important to know in the subject areas, and will include ways to analyze words from knowledge of their roots. For this part of it, there are Greek and Latin words of the month, and Wheelock's Latin quizzes.

Some notes about basic principles:

This list is in reverse order -- in understanding a language, there are four levels starting from smallest and moving upwards:

1. Word (words can be broken down into letters and syllables, but a word is the smallest unit of meaning).
   
2. Sentence (words put together so at to form a complete thought)
   
3. Paragraph (sentences put together in meaningful and coherent form).
   
4. Whole Work (anything from a short anecdote to a full length novel or biography)

There are two basic approaches to language or knowledge which we do in many ways in normal life:

• Analysis (breaking up something into its parts)
• Synthesis (putting things together to make something new). This means something similar to composition (action of or method of putting something together)
  

Something related to synthesis or composition is Mimesis or intelligent imitation-- trying to reflect something that is true and good, whether a thing from nature or from technique.