Post by Lene Mahler Jaqua on May 31, 2008 16:17:46 GMT -5
We would like to see students of Classical Writing well read and broadly read. In our books at the Jr. High level and up we have an assigned reading schedule. These works are optional reading assignments, but we recommend highly that your students read these works, at least concurrently with working their way through our curriculum.
Maxim – Assigned reading Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin, Julius Caesar (Shakespeare), Merchant of Venice (Shakespeare)… those are the only works the students read through as assigned reading during that first year of Junior high. – In addition we draw our models from ancient writers (Aristotle, Cicero, Aphthonius, etc) and we also get our models for analysis and imitation from In Praise of Folly by Erasmus, Erasmus’ Adages, some speeches by Churchill and Roosevelt, as well as Joseph Addison’s magazine The Spectator (late 1700’s).
Chreia – We assign some of the same sages for Chreia (ancient ones) as well as St. Basil’s Address to Young Men on Reading Greek Literature (400’s AD) , we read the Antigone by Sophocles all the way through (as well as analyze the judicial aspects of it], Seneca’s writings “On Transparency in Friendship”, Aeschylus’ Agamemnon (with the option of reading the whole of the Oresteia, or doing it in CW Herotodus), Robert Lewis Stevenson’s Treasure Island and Catriona, and finally Alexander Schmemann’s essay “Utopia or Escape” (the two ways that church is often viewed by contemporary Christians.)
Herodotus – We assign as reading .. Herodotus’ Histories (with a short detour into a couple of Ovid’s myths, but only tasteful ones), Aeschylus’ Oresteia (the hope is that this is for the second time), Athanasius “On the Incarnation” (300 AD’s about the Arian Heresy leading to the Nicene Creed), Bede’s Ecclesiastical History of the English People, Machiavelli’s The Prince.
Broadly speaking, in addition to these, we recommend strongly reading the bulk of the 19th century classic authors: Dlckens, Austen, Eliot, Trollope, Hardy, etc… for personal literature reading. The language is more complicated than what you get in a modern book, but not as challenging as the language in philosophy texts.
Note – When we mention plays, we recommend seeing a good production and reading along if you have the text.
Maxim – Assigned reading Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin, Julius Caesar (Shakespeare), Merchant of Venice (Shakespeare)… those are the only works the students read through as assigned reading during that first year of Junior high. – In addition we draw our models from ancient writers (Aristotle, Cicero, Aphthonius, etc) and we also get our models for analysis and imitation from In Praise of Folly by Erasmus, Erasmus’ Adages, some speeches by Churchill and Roosevelt, as well as Joseph Addison’s magazine The Spectator (late 1700’s).
Chreia – We assign some of the same sages for Chreia (ancient ones) as well as St. Basil’s Address to Young Men on Reading Greek Literature (400’s AD) , we read the Antigone by Sophocles all the way through (as well as analyze the judicial aspects of it], Seneca’s writings “On Transparency in Friendship”, Aeschylus’ Agamemnon (with the option of reading the whole of the Oresteia, or doing it in CW Herotodus), Robert Lewis Stevenson’s Treasure Island and Catriona, and finally Alexander Schmemann’s essay “Utopia or Escape” (the two ways that church is often viewed by contemporary Christians.)
Herodotus – We assign as reading .. Herodotus’ Histories (with a short detour into a couple of Ovid’s myths, but only tasteful ones), Aeschylus’ Oresteia (the hope is that this is for the second time), Athanasius “On the Incarnation” (300 AD’s about the Arian Heresy leading to the Nicene Creed), Bede’s Ecclesiastical History of the English People, Machiavelli’s The Prince.
Broadly speaking, in addition to these, we recommend strongly reading the bulk of the 19th century classic authors: Dlckens, Austen, Eliot, Trollope, Hardy, etc… for personal literature reading. The language is more complicated than what you get in a modern book, but not as challenging as the language in philosophy texts.
Note – When we mention plays, we recommend seeing a good production and reading along if you have the text.