Classics Discussion Group: Planning and Recruitment Thread

Cafe Society
1

Inspired by this thread- Liberal Arts – can you tell me where to start

I’d like to start up a reading/discussion group to work our way through the St. John’s College reading list (here). I’ve been wanting to try this for some time, but I just don’t have the organization or willpower to slog through all that material without some sense of deadlines and other people to talk to about what I’m taking in. I’ve never participated in a book club or online discussion thingy of this type before, so I hope that anybody who’s interested will have some good ideas for structure and such.

I’m not sure what the best approach to scheduling, but I’m strongly in favor of a pre-defined schedule for when each book or part of a book is completed and discussed, simply because I am a master procrastinator and if I don’t know I need to get a section read by a particular date, I’ll just get distracted and drop out. That said, the calendar they follow at St. John’s is pretty intense- after all it’s designed for full time undergrads, not people with full time jobs. It looks like the St. John’s timetable calls for 150 pages or so for each class, meeting twice a week (at least for my copy of the Iliad). Would cutting that in half by using their breakdown but extending the schedule to once a week be too much? As I said, I’m way open.

Well, anyone who’s interested, jump on the Classics Bandwagon!

2

I think even half would be kind of a lot for most people. Let me think about it, I would like to but am not sure I can take it on.

3

I’d like to, but I’m afraid of dropping out. Of course, I’ve read some of it already, so that’s kind of a head start.

4

As I said in the other thread, I’m in. I think 150 pages/week is pretty reasonable for me.

5

I’m interested, with some reservations. I’m not terribly concerned about the number of pages to be read per week–I read voraciously, and will just need to put a priority on reading some stuff which is “good for me”. I am a little concerned about how much discussion there actually will be, because I’ve not seen a lot of in-depth discussion of much of anything in CS except for certain individual episodes of TV shows. So I hope you will put some thought into how to encourage in depth discussion.

And, I reserve the right to decide I just don’t want to read a particular work, or that finding it isn’t worth my effort, and thus not participate. Especially if discussion ends up being kind of lame.

6

I’m interested, but would prefer to discuss a work in its entirety once a month rather than doing a weekly discussion of a work we’re all still reading.

7

** Eureka**- I agree- for this to be worthwhile, there needs to be more to the discussion than just “I read it, I loved it” and such. One thing that worked really well in some of my classes in school was requiring everyone to come up with 1-3 questions on the text- ranging from seemingly simple “wait… Who is this Achilles guy again?” type stuff to larger philosophical type stuff. The reason I like this model so much is that I tend to think I understand parts of a text that I really don’t grasp, and other people asking questions that I never would have considered opens up whole new realms.

I think a decent “rule” might also be that we should share our notes and any outside research with the group- so if you had a question while reading and found some help from a website, another book or a conversation IRL, you should post your question and what answer you got, as well as any further thoughts.

I openly confess that I don’t know what I’m doing with this type of material- what constitutes “in-depth discussion” to you [collectively]?

And, of course participation in any of the discussions would be voluntary- what am I going to do- hunt y’all down?

burundi- a book a month sounds good to me. How would you feel about two threads per book- one just for moral support and checking in with page counts, and one for substantive discussion opened up after the month is up (perhaps opened by the first group member who finifhes the book?)

8

That sounds great. I’m also trying to keep up with a real-life book club, so I don’t think I could read more than one book a month for the Classics Discussion.

9

I’m game.
One thing we do in seminars is for each reading assignment write up a ‘think piece’ that’s a thoughtful response/ reaction/consideration of questions it brings up. Might be good for everyone to have a paragraph or two of commentary to start with.

10

Ooh, I’m getting pretty excited- you are all dopers whose posts I enjoy.

dangermom- I noticed in the recent homeschooling thread that you and your daughter are doing Latin… Do you think she might enjoy working along through some of these texts with you? Obviously not reading the whole things (unless she is some kind of freakish super-genius), but maybe there are some decent children’s adaptations, especially of the Iliad and Odyssey that she could read while you are going through the original. They are such cool stories, and while not from the Latin originally, that’s how they were preserved and passed on to us. I remember being impressed when I figured out that, as long ago as the Romans were to us, they had the same perspective on the Greeks (does that parse?). Anyhow, I’m sure your curriculum is already set, just thinking “out loud” so to speak. I’d love to have you come along as far as you can!

11

(reads list)

Holy damn. I wish I had gone to a real school. :frowning:

-FrL-

(I’m an idiot who threw away a scholarship to a much better school because he wanted to go to school “with his friends.” If I could go back in time I’d slap myself so hard… :mad: )

[/TMI]

12

What constitutes in-depth discussion to me? Enough discussion to make me want to read the book if I forgot or something. And of course, some interaction–not just everyone posting 3 paragraphs of reaction, but some back and forth discussion. If we somehow got a thread to go to two pages, that would be good.

I’m not terribly fussy about what gets discussed, although I think some discussion of themes or something would be good, maybe a few “That reminds me of this movie or book” comments (where the book or movie need not be profound)

13

I’m up for this, although I am slightly nervous about the amount of reading it entails. I am a pretty voracious reader but I also have a ridiculous class load this semester. On the other hand, I would definitely welcome some intellectual stimulation - teaching Comp 101 is tiring in a lot of ways, but definitely not what I would call intellectually taxing. :slight_smile:

14

So would we start in order per that list, starting with the Illiad, or what?

15

That’s what I was thinking. Maybe set March 10 (monday) as the “due” date, when a full discussion thread will be posted? I’ve got to go home now, but I’ll be back on Monday (no internets on the weekend). If anybody wants to come up with a fun name and start an *Iliad * thread in the mean time, have at it.

16

I will mention, for your information only, that at St. John’s there are a few unwritten rules about discussing the Great Books.

First is that the text (i.e. the reading) is discussed strictly on its own terms, not, for instance, in terms of the author’s personal or historical context. (This probably won’t be much of a problem with Homer.)

Second is that one generally doesn’t refer to other works, except for earlier books in the Program. The obvious reason for this is that not everyone else participating in the conversation will have read that other work.

Third is that one is discouraged from reading introductions, critical essays, or other interpretations of the text. One is expected to do one’s own thinking and come to one’s own conclusions, and not be influenced by non-Program material. (Combining this and the previous “rule,” presenting some critic’s ideas in seminar as if they were your own is a high crime.)

There are probably a few other “rules” that NinjaChick or Tabula Rasa might mention.

I mention this not to insist that these rules be applied in our threads, but to acquaint the founders and participants of the Straight Dope Seminars[sup]TM[/sup] with the long-standing and, I think, successful practices of another discussion group.

Now, obviously there are a great many differences between a real-life college seminar and a message-board thread. But I think the reasons for St. John’s seminar “rules” are generally applicable to a book discussion thread, and the participants here may find it worth considering them.

I also think that the OP should consider making clear when starting these threads that they are different from other threads: that they have a more serious and scholarly intent than the average thread, that participants are expected to have read the reading recently, and that certain ground rules (as established by the OP) are in effect.

Or not. Just my two cents.

A final point: St. John’s seminars start with a question from one of the two faculty members in the group. The question serves as a jumping off point for the discussion, which may go off in other directions, but which is gently guided by the OP, I mean, faculty member. This technique could also be applied here, if we want.

17

I would love to try this but I’m nervous about letting people down. Let’s just say I’ll do my best.

18

Hmmm. I’m not sure what I think of this one. We can’t read things from a completely objective, tabula rasa viewpoint. Rather, we’re going to be reading these works in a 21st century historical context, with all of our own 21st beliefs and biases. Refusing to consider a book in its historical context seems as though it leads to situations like the people who get up in arms about the use of “nigger” in Huckleberry Finn.

19

On the other hand, sometimes one gets new insights by pretending to approach things tabula rasa style. I once was involved in a manuscript based discussion of the early part of the Gospel of Mark, where we pretended that the rest of the New Testament did not exist, or at least, we hadn’t read it yet, which was really neat until such time as we bogged down over people who refused to accept that in the early chapters of Mark, there is NO evidence for a Virgin Birth. (Classic Christmas story–Luke, with a side of Matthew).

And, you know, there’s a piece of this which is like a comment Harvey Fierstien makes in the commentary on Torch Song Trilogy. Yes, he wrote the character Arnold largely based on himself, his experiences and wishes, etc. But he wrote all the other characters as well, which means that all of them are pieces of himself as well. One can overdo the idea of examining a piece in it’s time/place thing, and read agendas where they don’t belong.

The rule that I don’t think is useful/productive for our context is not mentioning other works, for fear that people haven’t read them. Which is probably a bad paraphrase, but I think that if we want this group to flourish, we need to set the bar moderately low–no need to scare people off before we get started.

20

I’m in, although I think you’d better slow down the pace compared to St. John’s. People have jobs and families and plowing through dense works at the pace of a full-time undergrad might be daunting for a lot of people. Even half speed might be a little much.

I agree that threads should start with a specific question highlighting some aspect of the book rather than asking “The Illiad: what’d you all think?” The thread doesn’t have to stay on the question, it just provides a good jumping off point.

As far as the tabula rasa thing goes, it doesn’t mean you have to pretend that the writer isn’t writing at a different time. That would be silly. It means you try to understand the writer on his (almost always his) own terms. The Illiad contains attitudes about killing, slavery, honor and revenge that will horrify many modern readers, and not just pacifists either. You can deal with this by simply saying “Well, it’s an ancient tale. People thought differently back then.” Or you can try to deal directly with the text, and try to understand the mentality that Homer celebrated, not as a historical artifact, but as a way of looking at life.