I was lucky enough to get my part of my college education at a great books program – that is, a program based on the sort of education that’s been going over in England for centuries – back to the Regency time and beyond.
The big differences between what I did and what your average Regency gentleman did are:
1. I got to study the great works of Western literature in translation. Back in the day, you would have read Aristotle, Plato, Virgil and the rest in the original Greek and Latin.
2. I got to do it even though I’m a woman.
Self-Education
I’m almost a decade out of college now, and I still feel the effects of my great books education, in the best of ways. My world grew when I read those books, and, as I reread them, it’s still growing.
And if you’re in America, you’re literate, and you have a public library card, you too can read the books an educated Regency gentleman – an educated medieval gentleman, an educated Roman gentleman! – would have had (or longed to have) on his book shelves.
That’s the beautiful thing about education: it doesn’t have to stop. If there’s something you want to know about, if there’s wisdom you want to gain, you can do it. No, just reading books won’t give you all the benefit of reading them under brilliant professors and it won’t give you all the joy of discussing them with other eager-eyed students. But here are some hacks for the adult, self-starting student:
1. Try online courses, many of them free, in the subject area you’re interested in. iTunes U has a lot, and there are even Christian universities offering free, good content.
2. Use a book to help you find and understand good books. The Well-Educated Mind is one that will give you a guided course of good reading.
3. Pick translations of the great works that also have great introductions. Most copies of classic works in translation will contain introductions that explain the context of the work and why it’s important. I hardly ever skip these, because they’re like a mini-tour, giving me a heads-up about what I ought to be looking for when I read the book itself.
What Good Is It?
So, why should you try reading the great works? Well, I can’t answer it for you, but here are some benefits I’ve noticed for myself:
1. I have context. When I read new political ideas or religious ideas, they don’t seem bigger than they should. I can see where they fit on a continuum centuries long. When I read a new story, I can see the echoes of the old story it’s riffing on.
2. The Bible makes more sense. When you read other works written around the same time as the Bible, it helps you understand the Bible better – and also to admire it more! When you see what kinds of things were written at the same time, the truth and beauty of scripture stand out.
3. Some of it’s just plain enjoyable. So much of good literature is valued not just because it’s true or influential, but because it’s beautiful. Indulge yourself – read some Boethius!
4. You can recognize new lies as old ones. There isn’t much new under the sun. And if you’ve read about politics in Rome, you’ll learn something about politics in America. If you’ve read about temptation in Dante, you’ll recognize temptation in your day-to-day life.
5. You can recognize that truth is always truth. There’s something reassuring about reading across the centuries, because you can see that some things don’t change. The goodness of the Lord is everlasting, and it shows up in the written record of human history.
Question for you:
What’s your favorite old book? Or which do you think you’d enjoy reading the most?
Peace of Christ to you,
Originally posted 2012-09-12 10:00:00.
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