to the 20th century, and in locale from Mesopotamia and China to Europe and America. He focuses on intellectual history and ethics, taking underlying ideas of each great work and revealing how these ideas can be put to use in a moral and ethical life.Course Lecture Titles36 Lectures 30 minutes / lectureBonhoeffer, Letters and Papers From Prison Homer, Iliad Marcus Aurelius, Meditations Bhagavad Gita Book of Exodus Gospel of Mark Koran Gilgamesh Beowulf Book of Job Aeschylus, Oresteia Euripides, Bacchae Plato, Phaedo Dante, The Divine Comedy Shakespeare, Othello, the Moor of Venice Aeschylus, Prometheus Bound Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, The Gulag ArchipelagoShakespeare, Julius Caesar George Orwell, 1984 Vergil, Aeneid Pericles, Oration; Lincoln, Gettysburg Address Remarque, All Quiet on the Western Front Confucius, The Analects Machiavelli, The Prince Plato, Republic John Stuart Mill, On Liberty Sir Thomas Malory, Morte d'Arthur Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Faust, Part 1Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Faust, Part 2 Henry David Thoreau, WaldenGibbon, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire Lord Acton, The History of Freedom Cicero, On Moral Duties (De Officiis) Gandhi, An Autobiography Churchill, My Early Life; Painting as a Pastime; WWII Lessons from the Great Books

    Robinson Crusoe. Harry Potter. What do these memorable characters have in common? Why do we turn to certain stories again and again? And what impact have they made on world history? These 24 eye-opening lectures give fresh insight into some of the greatest heroes in world literature, from warriors such as Beowulf and Odysseus to unexpected heroes such as Uncle Tom and Sancho Panza.Professor Shippey gives you an inside glimpse into the writer's process. Learn how authors "write into the gap" to flesh out-or, in some cases, reimagine altogether-old stories, making them new for new readerships with different values. By examining what makes these heroes such compelling characters, you'll see how they provide a window to better understand ourselves.From the beginnings of world literature through today's bestsellers, look at what makes characters successful-and how they reflect our changing cultural mores. For instance, after the horrors of global war in the 20th century, the world was waiting for a hero like Frodo Baggins, J.R.R. Tolkien's meek hobbit hero, someone called to duty rather than born strong and fearless.You'll also examine ways that great heroes have changed the course of history, defining nations and redefining our sense of self and our relationships. From the mythical journey of Aeneas to Jane Austen's country dances, you'll survey a wealth of memorable stories and consider why such heroes were necessary-and how they continue to influence our lives today.

    With engaging literary and everyday examples, inspirational prompts, and unforgettable insights, this course is the perfect reference guide for both professional and casual writers.Survey the ways five major literary genres-fiction, essay, poetry, drama, and autobiography-can show you the path to stronger persuasive and critical writing. Writing prompts and practice examples will help you better understand how to apply the insights you'll uncover by studying each genre. See how the art of rhetoric can help you adapt your writing to different situations. The increased awareness of classical rhetoric you gain will go a long way toward making you a stronger writer by calling your attention to the basics of compelling analytical writing. Take a step-by-step look at the four major stages of the writing process-researching, writing a first draft, editing, and rewriting.Chock full of useful strategies and real-world examples, this course is an invaluable tool for developing your effective writing skills so you can better express yourself to others.Listening Length: 12 hours and 7 minutes

    36 lectures on 18 CDs (two 30 minute lectures per CD). In three parts, each in its own clamshell case. One course guidebook per part.

    But as any writer can tell you, the blank page can be daunting. It's tough to know where to get started, what details to include in each scene, and how to move from the kernel of an idea to a completed manuscript. Writing great fiction isn't a gift reserved for the talented few. There is a craft to storytelling that can be learned, and studying writing techniques can be incredibly rewarding - both personally and professionally. Even if you don’t have ambitions of penning the next Moby-Dick, you'll find value in exploring all the elements of fiction. From evoking a scene to charting a plot to revising your drafts, Writing Great Fiction: Storytelling Tips and Techniques offers a master class in storytelling. Taught by award-winning novelist James Hynes, a former visiting professor at the famed Iowa Writers' Workshop, these 24 insightful lectures show you the ins and outs of the fiction writer's craft. Get tips for developing believable and memorable characters, explore how to craft plausible dialogue that serves the purposes of your narrative, compare the advantages of different points of view, and more. A wealth of exercises will inspire you to practice the many techniques you learn. Professor Hynes is an able guide, showing you what has worked for him and other novelists, and pointing out pitfalls to avoid. Writing Great Fiction is truly an exceptional course for anyone interested in storytelling.©2014 The Teaching Company, LLC (P)2014 The Great Courses

    There are good reasons that language fascinates us so. It not only defines humans as a species, placing us head and shoulders above even the most proficient animal communicators, but it also beguiles us with its endless mysteries. For example: * How did different languages come to be? * Why isn’t there just a single language? * How does a language change, and when it does, is that change indicative of decay or growth? * How does a language become extinct? Dr. John McWhorter, one of America’s leading linguists and a frequent commentator on network television and National Public Radio, addresses these and other questions as he takes you on an in-depth, 36-lecture tour of the development of human language, showing how a single tongue spoken 150,000 years ago has evolved into the estimated 6,000 languages used around the world today.An accomplished scholar, Professor McWhorter is also a skilled popularizer, whose book The Power of Babel was called "startling, provocative, and remarkably entertaining," by the San Diego Union-Tribune.The London Times called him "a born teacher." And Steven Pinker, best known as the author of The Language Instinct, offered this praise for the book: "McWhorter’s arguments are sharply reasoned, refreshingly honest, and thoroughly original."Course Lecture Titles1. What Is Language? 2. When Language Began 3. How Language Changes—Sound Change 4. How Language Changes—Building New Material 5. How Language Changes—Meaning and Order 6. How Language Changes—Many Directions 7. How Language Changes—Modern English 8. Language Families—Indo-European 9. Language Families—Tracing Indo-European 10. Language Families—Diversity of Structures 11. Language Families—Clues to the Past 12. The Case Against the World’s First Language 13. The Case For the World’s First Language 14. Dialects—Subspecies of Species 15. Dialects—Where Do You Draw the Line? 16. Dialects—Two Tongues in One Mouth 17. Dialects—The Standard as Token of the Past 18. Dialects—Spoken Style, Written Style 19. Dialects—The Fallacy of Blackboard Grammar 20. Language Mixture—Words 21. Language Mixture—Grammar 22. Language Mixture—Language Areas 23. Language Develops Beyond the Call of Duty 24. Language Interrupted 25. A New Perspective on the Story of English 26. Does Culture Drive Language Change? 27. Language Starts Over—Pidgins 28. Language Starts Over—Creoles I 29. Language Starts Over—Creoles II 30. Language Starts Over—Signs of the New 31. Language Starts Over—The Creole Continuum 32. What Is Black English? 33. Language Death—The Problem 34. Language Death—Prognosis 35. Artificial Languages 36. Finale—Master Class

    Foundations 2. The Epic of Gilgamesh 3. Genesis and the Documentary Hypothesis 4. The Deuteronomistic History 5. Isaiah 6. Job 7. HomerThe Iliad 8. HomerThe Odyssey 9. Sappho and Pindar 10. Aeschylus 11. Sophocles 12. Euripides 13. Herodotus 14. Thucydides 15. Aristophanes 16. Plato 17. Menander and Hellenistic Literature 18. Catullus and Horace 19. Virgil 20. Ovid 21. Livy, Tacitus, Plutarch 22. Petronius and Apuleius 23. The Gospels 24. Augustine 25. Beowulf 26. The Song of Roland 27. El Cid 28. Tristan and Isolt 29. The Romance of the Rose 30. Dante AlighieriLife and Works 31. Dante AlighieriThe Divine Comedy 32. Petrarch 33. Giovanni Boccaccio 34. Sir Gawain and the Green Knight 35. Geoffrey ChaucerLife and Works 36. Geoffrey ChaucerThe Canterbury Tales 37. Christine de Pizan 38. Erasmus 39. Thomas More 40. Michel de Montaigne 41. François Rabelais 42. Christopher Marlowe 43. William ShakespeareThe Merchant of Venice 44. William ShakespeareHamlet 45. Lope de Vega 46. Miguel de Cervantes 47. John Milton 48. Blaise Pascal 49. Molière 50. Jean Racine 51. Sister Juana Inés de la Cruz 52. Daniel Defoe 53. Alexander Pope 54. Jonathan Swift 55. Voltaire 56. Jean-Jacques Rousseau 57. Samuel Johnson 58. Denis Diderot 59. William Blake 60. Johann Wolfgang von Goethe 61. William Wordsworth 62. Jane Austen 63. Stendhal 64. Herman Melville 65. Walt Whitman 66. Gustave Flaubert 67. Charles Dickens 68. Fyodor Dostoevsky 69. Leo Tolstoy 70. Mark Twain 71. Thomas Hardy 72. Oscar Wilde 73. Henry James 74. Joseph Conrad 75. William Butler Yeats 76. Marcel Proust 77. James Joyce 78. Franz Kafka 79. Virginia Woolf 80. William Faulkner 81. Bertolt Brecht 82. Albert Camus 83. Samuel Beckett 84. ConclusionListening Length: 42 hours and 55 minutes

    His language and culture - those of Elizabethan England - are greatly different from our own, and his poetry, thick with metaphorical imagery and double meanings, can be hard to penetrate.Yet the keys to understanding Shakespeare are written into the plays themselves. If you can learn to recognize the playwright's own clues, you'll become able to engage meaningfully with his language, to follow the plot structures and themes that drive his plays, and to track the development of his characters.Over the course of 24 lectures, this innovative and penetrating exploration of Shakespeare's plays reveals how to enter Shakespeare's dramatic world, how to grasp what's happening in any of his plays, and how to enjoy them fully both on the page and the stage.Under Professor Conner's expert guidance, shaped by decades of studying and performing Shakespeare, you learn more than 40 interpretive tools, drawn from the texts themselves, that give you direct insight into the plays. These guiding principles allow you to follow the narratives of the plays as they unfold, with a clear understanding of how the plays function and fit together.The professor also reveals fascinating details of Shakespeare's era, which shed further light on the plays and the way his contemporary audiences perceived them.This course builds the skills that allow you to reach your own understanding of the plays - to deeply comprehend Shakespeare's transcendent poetic language, the spellbinding world of his great characters and stories, and his revelatory reflections on human experience.Disclaimer: Please note that this recording may include references to supplemental texts or print references that are not essential to the program and not supplied with your purchase.©2013 The Teaching Company, LLC (P)2013 The Great Courses

    Classic stories and poems of American literature are found in the pages of Franklin, Emerson, Thoreau, Hawthorne, Melville, Dickinson, Twain, Whitman, Faulkner, James, Eliot, Fitzgerald, Hemingway, Steinbeck, Morrison, and many others. As Professor Arnold Weinstein reminds us: "American classics are wonderfully rich fare. America is a mythic land, a place with a sense of its own destiny and promise, a place that has experienced bloody wars to achieve that destiny. The events of American history shine forth in our classics." When was the last time you read them? Possibly not as recently as you'd like. Why? Not because you wouldn't love it. But perhaps the demands of your daily life or some other reason have prevented this pleasure. Now, here is the opportunity to gain an extraordinary familiarity with each of these authors within a manageable amount of time, as well as review the great works you may already know. What Explains Greatness? These works are both American and classics. The course has been crafted to explain why some works become classics while others do not, why some "immortal" works fade from our attention completely, and even why some contemporary works now being ignored or snubbed by critics may be considered immortal one day. One memorable work at a time, you'll see how each of these masterpieces shares the uncompromising uniqueness that invariably marks the entire American literary canon. From Sleepy Hollow to The Great Gatsby, Professor Weinstein contends that the literary canon lives, grows, and changes. What links these writers to each other—and to us readers today—is the awareness that the past lives and changes as generations of writers and readers step forward to interpret it anew. The course was born from Professor Weinstein's conviction that American literature is our "great estate," and that claiming this rightful inheritance—the living past and the lessons we can take from it—should be nothing less than a unique and joyous learning experience. Experience Two Centuries of America's Greatest Works Professor Weinstein explains that America's classic works should be savored as part of our inner landscape: part of how we see both America and ourselves. He leads you through more than two centuries of the best writers America has yet produced, bringing out the beauty of their language, the excitement of their stories, and the value in what they say about life, power, love, adventure, and what it means, in every sense, to be American. Perhaps you recall: --Melville's prowling Ahab, on the search for Moby Dick, and the power of the "grand, ungodly, Godlike man" --The quiet diner in The Grapes of Wrath and the pain of one of John Steinbeck's "Okies" trying to purchase a dime's worth of bread. --The parlor in Long Day's Journey Into Night and the lifetime of tension in a simple request to a father that he turn on the lights. Rip Van Winkle falls asleep for 25 years for some mysterious reason—but what exactly was it? Why did Emerson believe in self-reliance, and why do we? Twain, our first media celebrity, tells stories that have an inkling of Peter Pan: Tom Sawyer never does grow up. But Huck Finn must grow up to face the racism of the South and get past his own polluted conscience—can he do it? James brings American innocents to Europe for them to inherit the world—but do they? Discover the Stories behind America's Immortal Writers Consider that: --Emily Dickinson was virtually unheard of in her own time. --William Faulkner's books were out of print until the mid-1940s. --F. Scott Fitzgerald died believing he had been forgotten. Readers of their times would be astounded if they knew the immortality these writers achieved, just as we are astounded that they once were overlooked. Most of us don't know that when Walt Whitman self-published Leaves of Grass—seemingly in answer to Ralph Waldo Emerson's memorable wish for the poet America deserved—he sent a copy to Emerson, America's most revered man of letters. When Emerson replied in extraordinarily flattering terms, Whitman published his letter, virtually forcing the new poet's acceptance by a literati that would might have preferred to flee from Whitman's startlingly new, often sexual, poetry. Perhaps you share the common picture of Emily Dickinson: a passive, gentle, reclusive spinster content in her father's Amherst, Massachusetts, home. If so, allow Professor Weinstein to introduce you to her friend, clergyman and author Thomas Wentworth Higginson, who said of "gentle" Emily: "I never was with anyone who drained my nerve power so much. Without touching her, she drew from me. I am glad not to live near her." Through this course, you will learn to: --Explain the roles of self-reliance and the "self-made man" in the evolution of American literature --Identify the tenets of American Romanticism --Describe the evolution of the American ghost story, from Poe and Hawthorne to James and Morrison --Outline the epic strain in American literature, from Melville and Whitman to Faulkner and Ellison --Explain the importance of slavery as a critical subject for Stowe, Twain, Faulkner, and Morrison --Summarize perspectives on nature revealed in poets Whitman, Dickinson, Frost, and Eliot --Identify the tenets of Modernism in the work of Eliot, Fitzgerald, Hemingway, and Faulkner --Identify the contributions of O'Neill, Miller, and Williams to American theater --Summarize the threads of the complex relationship between America's great writers and the past. Savor the Joy of Great ReadingDr. Weinstein is the Edna and Richard Salomon Distinguished Professor at Brown University, where he has been teaching literature to packed classrooms since 1968. Brown University student course evaluation summaries reported: "By far, students' greatest lament was that they only got to listen to Professor Weinstein once a week." One customer writes: "Professor Weinstein is inspiring. Not only am I enjoying these lectures, but I am also rereading these wonderful classics and having a wonderful time." The course will lead you to read or reread masterpieces that intrigue you most. And with the deeper understanding you gain from the lectures, you will likely experience such joy from great reading that you may wonder why you have spent so much time on contemporary books. The 84 carefully crafted lectures in this course, each 30 minutes long, are your royal road to recapturing the American experience—and our intellectual and cultural heritage. Just review the lecture titles. All of this can be yours, and the journey will be as rewarding as the arrival.

    Explore the mythologies of Europe, the Americas, Asia, Africa, and the Middle East. Learn what makes these stories so important, distinctive, and able to withstand the test of time. Discover how, despite geographical implausibilities, many myths from across the oceans share themes, morals, and archetypes.Listening Length: 31 hours and 35 minutes

    It's a cutting-edge genre that's reshaping how we write (and read) everything from biographies and memoirs to blogs and public speaking scripts to personal essays and magazine articles.Whether you're looking to launch into a new professional career as a creative nonfiction writer, dabble in the genre as a pastime, start a personal blog, or simply get inside the mind of a creative nonfiction writer at work, these dynamic 24 lectures are a chance for you to explore the entire process of writing creative nonfiction, from brainstorming for the perfect idea to getting your final product noticed by literary agents and publishers.Filled with helpful tips and techniques, memorable examples from well-known writers, and engaging exercises, it's a learning experience that proves that - with the right instructor - writing creative nonfiction can be mastered, practiced, and enjoyed by anyone with a desire to share his or her personal story. Professor Mazzeo guides you throughthe fundamental concepts such as narrative arcs, captivating beginnings, sentence variation, perspective, characterization, dialogue, and metaphor; each stage of writing creative nonfiction, from researching your topic to revising your first draft; and the publishing process, from finding an agent to writing a successful book proposal.You'll come away with the knowledge, tools, and, most important, inspiration you need to discover your stories and finally start telling them the right way.

    Much has been written to assess his lasting legacy and why he has had such a profound impact on 20th-century readers.As well as delving into the plots of Lewis's enduring works, you will consider questions such as:From the magisterial "Oxford History of English Literature" to children's fantasy books, how did Lewis write with such brilliance and coherence across so many distinct and demanding fields?What were the people, events, and influences that shaped his thought, his character, and the spiritual drama at his life's core?What do Lewis's fictional and factual autobiographies reveal about his conversion and his efforts to "explain and defend the belief that has been common to nearly all Christians at all times"?How did he argue for his ethical notion of "the Tao"—a non-relative set of standards, held widely across all cultures, which modern ideologies often distort?How did he use his apologetical writings to come to grips with perennial spiritual questions involving miracles; the meaning of suffering; the reality of heaven and hell; and the nature of choice, sin, and salvation?How do his scholarly works analyze modern prejudices about the past and offer a vivid, accessible defense of medieval and Renaissance thought?In Lectures 7 through 11, we turn to Lewis the fictional novelist:The unfallen world of Perelandra in the Space Trilogy (1938–45)The beloved Chronicles of Narnia (1950–1956) children's series for which he is perhaps best knownTill We Have Faces (1961), a mature and beautiful reworking of the Cupid and Psyche myth whose heroine is patterned after Lewis's wife, Joy.Professor Louis Markos is a member of Phi Beta Kappa and has won teaching awards at both the University of Michigan and Houston Baptist University. He presents this course as a sympathetic, deeply felt exposition of Lewis's multifaceted thought and works, making no secret of the fact that he is a longtime and enthusiastic fan of Lewis's writings.

    Introducing Argumentation and Rhetoric History of Argumentation Studies Formal and Informal Argument The Emergence of Controversy Resolutions and Issues Stasis The Focal Point of Dispute Presumption and Burden of Proof Argument Analysis and Diagramming Claims and Evidence Reasoning from Parts to Whole Moving from Cause to Effect Establishing Correlations Analogy, Narrative, and Form What Makes a Sound Argument? Fallacies in Reasoning Validity and Fallacies Reconsidered Assembling a Case Attack and Defense I Attack and Defense II Language and Style in Argumentation Arguments between Friends Arguments among Experts Public Argument and Democratic Life The Ends of Argumentation

    But what is grammar? In fact, it's the integral basis of how we speak and write.As such, a refined awareness of grammar opens a world of possibilities for both your pleasure in the English language and your skill in using it, in both speech and the written word. As a foundation for writing, a detailed grounding in grammar and usage will hugely expand your resources for meaningful verbal expression, for navigating the subtleties of the language, and for achieving clarity of communication and stylistic power.In English Grammar Boot Camp, linguist and popular Great Courses instructor Professor Curzan takes you on an enjoyable exploration of the essential aspects of English grammar. These 24 spirited and accessible lectures offer you a comprehensive core training - a linguistic "boot camp," by which we mean a thorough immersion in all of the key elements of English grammar and usage, in their most immediate, practical application.Here you get a breadth of perspective and context you won't find elsewhere, leaving you with a more choices and rich verbal resources for your own use of the language. In discussing the different parts of speech, Professor Curzan directs your attention to how the element at hand evolved. Highlighting reflections from 18th- and 19th-century usage guides as well as from multiple modern commentators, she guides you in examining real-world language use in a variety of contexts, helping you develop a sophisticated frame of reference and a deep awareness of the idiosyncrasies of English.This delightful and superbly insightful course offers you a unique opportunity to explore the linguistic riches of the English language, and to significantly deepen your mastery of grammar, usage, and style.

    Each part contains six audio cassettes and course guidebook in a clamshell case.