Browse our books below. You can also search for books.
HANSON, V.D., and J. HEATH, Who Killed Homer? The Demise of Classical Education and the Recovery of Greek Wisdom. Encounter Books, San Francisco, 2001. First paperback ed. XXIX,328p. Paperback. ‘If Hanson and Heath are to be remembered in 10 years or20, it will not be because ‘Who Killed Homer?’was controversial in 1998, but because they have something to say about Classics that transcends the present academic situation. What they have done is to draw on their own teaching experience - both authors have been recipients of the American Philological Association’s Excellence in Teaching Award - to present a strategy not just for teaching Classics, but for encouraging personal intellectual involvement. They discuss how a teacher can ‘highlight some of the different visions embedded in the poems and … reveal the challenges -and rewards- of teaching the ‘Iliad’ (p.194). Chapter Five, ‘What We can Do’, explores the possibilities of instituting a university curriculum based on Classics. Like Plato’s ideal Republic, this ideal University may be laid up in the heavens as a pattern, rather than existing here on earth, but it is a pattern by which we can assess and improve our own curricula. Finally, the appendix ‘When All We Can Do Is Read’ offers suggestions for the intelligent and dedicated layman, in the form of thumbnail reviews of 20 books, ancient and modern, that Hanson and Heath consider valuable for anyone who wants to learn more about the Greeks. Throughout the book, the emphasis is on learning, whether formally or informally. It is this concern for the individual experience of learning to look at the Greeks with new eyes that makes ‘Who Killed Homer?’ worthwhile reading not only for classicists but for everyone who lover Classics.’ (RALPH E. DOTY in The Classical Outlook, 1998, p.35). € 15.00 (Antiquarian) ISBN: 9781893554269