Ancient literature reading list

[Calizzy]

Planning for 9th next year, dd is an ambitious student. Good reader, enjoys Shakespeare, Jane Austen, Thornton Wilder; but has never read ancient texts. I am considering Schole Academy's Ancient Lit, which I would couple with SWB History of the Ancient World, but Schole's reading list is quite shorter than Wilson Hill or  CLRC. I often feel like dd is not challenged enough, but I also think CLRC looks a bit overwhelming. Here is Schole's reading list:

• Illiad, Homer, trans. Robert Fagles 
• Prometheus Bound, Seven Famous Greek Plays
• Oedipus Rex, Sophocles, Seven Famous Greek Plays 
• Antigone, Sophocles, Seven Famous Greek Plays 
• Republic, Plato, trans. Alan Bloom 
• The Apostolic Fathers in English, trans. Michael W. Holmes
• The Desert Fathers: Sayings of the Ancient Christian Monks
• On the Cosmic Mystery of Jesus Christ, Maximos the Confessor

It's about 1 book/month. Is that enough?

[ScoutTN]

I think it is enough.

Schole chooses deeper rather than wider and has much more focus on early Christian texts than some other courses. Most high school Ancients courses would include The Aeneid and possibly other Roman works, Gilgamesh, and possibly other ANE works. Some would have texts from India or China also included. A fair number would do both The Illiad and The Odyssey.
 

I think it depends on your student and your goals too. Some students handle a lengthy reading list fine, others are overwhelmed and lose the thinking/processing part of the course in just getting the work done. You might also check into and compare the writing assignments - how will your student be expected to respond to the reading?

I think a class that helps students to read these texts well will equip them for reading other similar works later. There are always more books to read and not every student is ready to read a long list of “Great Books” at age 14! 

Edited February 14, 2022 by ScoutTN

[Lori D.]

Those last 4 works are nonfiction heavy-hitter thinking works of theology/philosophy, so that balances out the shorter plays in the list, which each will take well under a month to read/discuss. 

Are you planning on having your student take the Scole online class? If not, will you have materials to help walk your student through those works? They are not works "just for reading" -- you really want a good guide (print guide or actual teacher as guide) to help get through esp. those last 4 works. 😉

Also, if NOT taking the class, but just pulling from the Scole list, I strongly suggest taking into consideration your student's interests. For example, if the student is more story-oriented (which I'm guessing from the Austen/Shakespeare reading your listed), and not that "into" the nonfiction/deep thinking works, then I personally would drop the last 3 of those last 4 works (keep The Republic), and substitute some other works that are more story-like AND include other ancient cultures, such as:

- The Epic of Gilgamesh -- Mesopotamian epic; oldest surviving work of lit. in the world, and well worth reading
- Tales of Ancient Egypt (Green) -- not a hard read at all; useful for seeing the ancient mindset and the mythology
- an assortment of Greek myths
- The Odyssey (Homer) -- another epic -- series of adventure episodes (the Iliad is the 20-year Trojan War, so much is on battles)
- The Aeneid (Virgil) -- another epic -- fall of Troy (Trojan horse episode), and search for a new homeland, resulting in founding of Rome
- Till We Have Faces (CS Lewis) -- 20th century work, but a retelling of the Cupid & Psyche myth from a Christian perspective, set in a fictional ancient Mesopotamian land, with an Ancient Greek character playing a large role
- The Thief (#1), or, Thick As Thieves (#5) (Turner) -- while part of a 6-book series, both of these work as stand-alone works; contemporary, in a fictionalized Greek/Persian setting -- #5 is outstandingly written, with lots to discuss lit.-wise, beyond the ancient setting

There are several options for support of the Homer epics:
- Memoria Press: The Iliad and The Odyssey -- lectures and guides
- The Great Courses: Greek Tragedy -- lectures by Elizabeth Vandiver, on several of those Greek plays + the Iliad
- The Great Courses: Greek Mythology -- lectures by Elizabeth Vandiver, on various myths, plus the play Oedipus
- The Great Courses: The Odyssey of Homer -- lectures by Elizabeth Vandiver
- The Great Courses: The Iliad of Homer -- lectures by Elizabeth Vandiver

JMO! BEST of luck as you plan for 9th grade. Warmest regards, Lori D.

[ScoutTN]

Agreeing with Lori about the theology/nonfiction selections. They would more typically be found in a history class. Is this course one credit in English?Some providers with a classical or great books approach integrate English with History and give more than one credit for it. 

If I were shopping for a straight-up lit class, the nonfiction books might be a deal breaker for me. I would not want those in lieu of the traditional literature choices for this time period. As always, YMMV. 

Course planning is so fun, but so frustrating too! 

[Lori D.]

2 hours ago, ScoutTN said:

...Is this course one credit in English?Some providers with a classical or great books approach integrate English with History and give more than one credit for it. 

If I were shopping for a straight-up lit class, the nonfiction books might be a deal breaker for me. I would not want those in lieu of the traditional literature choices for this time period. As always, YMMV. 

Course planning is so fun, but so frustrating too! 

Totally agree. 😉

[Calizzy]

The class is purely Ancient Greek Lit with no composition. We would do composition separately, as well as history separately. Why exactly would you not want those nonfiction books? I'm trying to think this through. My main objective is for her to think deeply and discuss ideas, so I think I'm ok with the nonfiction texts. Thanks for the input. 

[Lori D.]

On 2/11/2022 at 6:08 PM, Calizzy said:

The class is purely Ancient Greek Lit with no composition. We would do composition separately, as well as history separately. Why exactly would you not want those nonfiction books? I'm trying to think this through. My main objective is for her to think deeply and discuss ideas, so I think I'm ok with the nonfiction texts. Thanks for the input. 

I personally would use those last 3 books as part of a Theology or Religious Studies credit, rather than as Literature. But it's your homeschool, your rules, and your booklists for making a credit. 😉  

And sure, I have nothing against concurrent study in History, Literature, and Theology/Philosophy. That can be great, covering a wide range of types of works (fiction and nonfiction literature, in the different subject areas with different focus) all written in, and reflecting on, a particular time/place. (We did quite a bit of that during high school.)

However, why I am NOT a fan of using a lot of nonfiction for specifically a LITERATURE course or credit. Works of fictional Literature (novels, novellas, short stories, plays, and poetry) -- are written, and therefore analyzed, VERY differently than nonfiction (essays, biographies, histories, etc.). Nonfiction is very straightforward with the writing, presenting main ideas directly, without subtext. Nonfiction generally works best as part of your History, Philosophy, or Science studies.

Literature (broadly "fiction" -- as opposed to nonfiction), usually involves a deep dive into literature topics (such as genre conventions, character choices/consequences, how the work fits in (or doesn't) with other works by the same author, etc.). Additionally, the literary elements in these works of fiction literature (such as irony, setting, conflict, plot, motif, characterization, etc.) are not really used much in nonfiction. And these literary elements are often in support of the indirect themes weaving throughout the work of fiction -- whereas, again, nonfiction directly states "big ideas" up front, without any indirect themes.

Finally, the the characteristics of plays and poetry are incredibly different from nonfiction, and each of those types of literature have their own unique structures, conventions, and language use -- such that they really can't be compared to works of nonfiction in the way you can compare with other types of fiction literature (novels and short stories).

In short, it's a different type of thinking deeply and analyzing that is done with fiction-Literature, than with nonfiction writings. For a course that is billed as "Ancient Literature", I personally would find that to be very limiting -- all Ancient Greek and no other ancient cultures and thinking, and only 1 epic and 3 plays -- and the other HALF of the works on the booklist are 1 nonfiction philosophy work + 3 meditative/religious/theological nonfiction works. 

Again, sure, I would use those works and enjoy them -- but I would be counting the half of the booklist towards "Philosophy/Theology," and adding in other ancient fiction-literature (see my above post), in order to get a fuller and richer experience of Ancient fiction-literature, and in the type of analysis/thinking required by fiction-literature, which is not part of nonfiction logic and philosophy works.

Just my explanation, since you asked. 😉 Totally up to you, as to what your goals are. Whatever you go with, enjoy your Ancient History / Lit / Theology studies for 9th grade! Warmest regards, Lori D.

Edited February 14, 2022 by Lori D.

[cintinative]

I just commented on your other thread, BUT if you are interested in doing something that integrates history/lit and possibly theology, you could look at those lists.

We have covered some books that some might consider faith-based as part of our history studies, but the focus was not theology. We covered important works that helped to understand that time period. For example, we covered Augustine's Confessions, parts of Calvin's Institutes, and selections from Summa Theologica (via Summa of the Summa). We also read accounts of the Crusades and Bede's History of the English People. We touched on the Old Testament as part of ancient history as well. Philosophy has played in pretty heavily in our Early Modern studies. 

That said, there are some integrated humanities programs, such as Wilson Hill's and Omnibus (Veritas Press) that lump in theology and so partial credit is given for theology.  

I spent a good amount of time evaluating options and figuring out what we wanted to do, so here is some unsolicited advice:

1. Most colleges will want to see government and economics. Unless you want to double up and do history and government/econ in one year, then you need to look at a three year program. Some of what is out there covers the government and econ as part of the great books study, but many do not.

2. You need to consider what you want to do about U.S. history. Most colleges require this also.  Some programs include it in the Great Books coursework, but not all (like Old Western Culture, which doesn't go that modern).  So you will want to look at if it is included in some way, or that is another box you will need to check in addition to the Great Books classes. 

3. If you consider a video based curriculum (like Old Western Culture), watch a sample video with your kid and see what they think.  My kids don't tend to like video-based curriculums, and if you do OWC, you are sort of setting yourself on a path that is hard to divert from. It would be tough to switch from that to another program.

4. It is possible to piecemeal this, but it is a lot of work. We are doing history at home and lit with House of Humane Letters.  My youngest will not get the most ideal line up of history and lit because he didn't start history until 9th grade, so we are covering all of history in three years.  My oldest took the Great Conversation I class in 8th so I didn't need to cover ancients with him.  

5. If doing an integrated humanities class without composition, consider how much time comp will add.  For my kids, composition is a necessity.  

[Lori D.]

Lots of great info in @cintinative's post.

I'll just add an observation:

I've only ever seen a FEW colleges require 0.5 credit each of Gov't and Econ for admission. It is at the HIGH SCHOOL level where you run into the Gov't/Econ requirement -- as part of the public high school graduation requirements. Not many states have requirements for HOMESCHOOL graduation, but it's always good to check to see if you might be required as a homeschooler to complete a certain # of a certain type of credits for legal homeschool high school diploma awarding.

On the other hand, yes MANY colleges require 1.0 credit of American History for admission (and often 1.0 credit of World History or World Geography -- but, that's no problem with Integrated or chronological world history studies 😉 ). HOWEVER, those fall under Social Studies, which tends to one of the subjects that colleges are willing to be flexible about -- Math and English, not so much, but Social Studies, yes, some colleges (not all) that require certain types of Social Studies credits are willing to substitute for other types of Social Studies credits.

One last side thought -- and, I'll preface this first by saying I'm personally a big fan of having a good amount of the Humanities and Fine Arts in the high school line up to be part a well-rounded high school education... However, the further into high school you go, the more it becomes important to be able to adjust YOUR own vision of high school to be able to accommodate what might be priorities to the student.

 if Integrated Humanities or Classical style studies of History+Literatue+Philosophy/Theology are of high interest to your student -- awesome! But if you find that this is not of high interest to your student as you move into the high school years, AND trying to complete a 4 years of Integrated or Classical studies is actually causing your student to not be able to follow interests/passions or take advantage of opportunities in the subject areas of high interest to the student, it is absolutely OKAY to let go of "completing the cycle" and just do the required Social Studies credits in order to have more time for the passions and the career interest areas.

Also, it is absolutely okay to switch away from an Integrated study to allow your student to pursue other Social Studies courses of high interest -- such as: Psychology, Political Science, Geography, Archeology, Anthropology, Sociology, etc. As far as I have seen, all of the different Social Studies topic areas are accepted by colleges as counting towards the total # of Social Studies credits required for admissions. Hurray for options! 😄 

Edited February 14, 2022 by Lori D.

[ScoutTN]

What does your student want to study?!

Ime, high school kids need some input. Buy-in from them is essential.

 

Edited February 18, 2022 by ScoutTN

[goldenecho]

The free world history curriculum on this site is based almost entirely on primary source documents (translated of course)...as well as some archeological material.   It's shorter passages (not full books), but it also really gets into how to read/interpret/understand  primary source material so would be an excellent addition to the longer works you're having her read.  

https://www.marionbrady.com/
 

Let me know if you would like some suggestions for primary source material for the middle ages, especially during Spanish colonization.