Category Archives: The Great Books

Inchoate thoughts on Dante’s Inferno

Posted on May 21, 2021 by Tommy Collison

“Will you – should either head back to the world – bring comfort to my memory, which lies still lashed beneath the stroke of envious eyes?” Inferno, Canto 13.76-78. I’m about a third of the way through Inferno, just finished Canto 13, … Continue reading →

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Similarities and Differences between The Iliad and Beowulf

Posted on May 12, 2021 by Tommy Collison

We spent a bit of time in a recent discussion series noting the similarities and differences between Beowulf, the character, and Hector and Achilles, the central characters of The Iliad. Similarities Both present a worldview where warriors are valorized. Both present a … Continue reading →

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Questions on The Canterbury Tales

Posted on May 2, 2021 by Tommy Collison

How do we pin down how Chaucer really feels about things? Can we do so? Where are the tensions in the stories, or among the characters? What do we make of one of the central tales, the Wife of Bath’s? … Continue reading →

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Bawdiness in The Canterbury Tales

Posted on April 27, 2021 by Tommy Collison

I knew absolutely nothing about The Canterbury Tales before it was on my great books list and before I read it in the last two weeks. David and I decided to add it to “Reading The Greats” discussion series, and I’m … Continue reading →

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Antigone, Redux

Posted on March 16, 2021 by Tommy Collison

I’m co-hosting a discussion series on the great books over on the Interintellect, and we have two “sessions.” We do the same 15-book syllabus, but we have two groups staggered across a month: we discussed The Iliad with Group 1 … Continue reading →

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Philosophers “preparing themselves for dying.” Plato’s Phaedo

Posted on February 28, 2021 by Tommy Collison

I spent part of the weekend rereading Plato’s Phaedo ahead of the next Interintellect salon and an upcoming conversation I’m having with Agnes Callard on the book. It was both my first time rereading a Classic, and it’s also an … Continue reading →

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Why does The Iliad remind me of the Marvel franchise?

Posted on February 21, 2021 by Tommy Collison

This post sort of contains spoilers. I co-host a series of discussions on the Great Books on the Interintellect (with the incomparable David McDougall). We’re hosting two “sections” to accommodate demand, which is a nice thing to be able to … Continue reading →

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“Good lives are made so by discipline.” Morals in Antigone (Sophocles)

Posted on February 18, 2021 by Tommy Collison

This post contains spoilers. “Antigone in front of the dead Polynices” by Nikiforos Lytras, 1865. Antigone is a short play, first performed circa 450 BCE, that deals with open-ended questions around the power of the state, divine law versus moral law, and … Continue reading →

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