My ongoing effort to improve myself (and I need a lot of improvement)

Below is a proposed classics curriculim from a Professor Platt at Dartmouth College. I figure anyplace that served as the basis for Animal House can't be all bad so I am going to see how much of this I can slog through and I do mean slog. I have read the Iliad and the Oddysey before for example and god they were boring. At least Moby Dick isn't on the list single biggest waste of time ever.


First Year
First Quarter
First Week
1) Genesis2) Hesiod, Theogony3) Hesiod, Works and Days
Second Week
1) Homer, Iliad 1-42) Homer, Iliad 5-83) Homer, Iliad 9-12
Third Week
1) Homer, Iliad 13-162) Homer, Iliad 17-203) Homer, Iliad 21-24
Fourth Week
1) Gilgamesh2) Thucydides 13) Thucydides 2
Fifth Week
1) Thucydides 3-52) Thucydides 6-83) Job
Sixth Week
1) Aeschylus, Oresteia2) Sophocles, Oedipus Tyrannus3) Sophocles, Antigone
Seventh Week
1) Isaiah2) Aristophanes, Clouds3) Aristophanes, Frogs
Eighth Week
1) Plato, Apology2) Plato, Crito3) Plato, Phædo
Ninth Week
1) Plato, Republic 2) Plato, Republic 2-33) Plato, Republic 4-5
Tenth Week
1) Plato, Republic 6-72) Plato, Republic 8-93) Plato, Republic 10
Second Quarter
First Week
1) Plato’s Symposium2) Song of Solomon3) Psalms
Second Week
1) Aristotle, Ethics 1-22) Aristotle, Ethics 3-43) Aristotle, Ethics 5-6
Third Week
1) Aristotle, Ethics 7-82) Aristotle, Ethics 9-103) Aristotle, Politics 1-2
Fourth Week
1) Aristotle, Politics 3-42) Aristotle, Politics 7-83) Aristotle, Poetics
Fifth Week
1) Aristotle, Metaphysics 12) Aristotle, Metaphysics 13) Aristotle, Physics 2
Sixth Week
1) Aristotle, Physics 22) Aristotle, On The Soul 1-23) Aristotle, On The Soul 2-3
Seventh Week
1) Aristotle, Physics 72) Aristotle, Physics 73) Aristotle, Metaphysics 11
Eighth Week
1) Lucretius, On The Nature of Things 1-22) Lucretius, On The Nature of Things 3-43) Lucretius, On The Nature of Things 5-6
Ninth Week
1) Livy 12) Polybius 63) Cicero, De Re Publica
Tenth Week
1) Plutarch, Caesar, Alexander2) Plutarch, Romulus, Theseus
Third Quarter
First Week
1) Exodus2) Exodus3) Deuteronomy
Second Week
1) Virgil, Aeneid 1-32) Virgil, Aeneid 4-6, Georgics 4
Third Week
1) Virgil, Aeneid 7-122) Tacitus, Annals 1-63) Tacitus, History 1-5
Fourth Week
1) Matthew2) Paul, Romans3) Revelation
Fifth Week
1) Augustine, Confessions2) Augustine, Confessions3) Augustine, City of God
Sixth Week
1) Augustine, City of God2) Aquinas, Summa Theologica3) Aquinas, Summa Theologica
Seventh Week
1) Aquinas, Summa Theologica 2) Aquinas, Summa Theologica3) Dante, Inferno
Eighth Week
1) Ibn Kaldun, The Muqaddimah2) Ibn Kaldun, The Muqaddimah3) Dante, Inferno
Ninth Week
1) Dante, Inferno2) Dante, Paradiso3) Dante, Paradiso
Tenth Week
1) Njal Saga2) Njal Saga3) Song of Roland
Second Year
First Quarter
First Week
1) Montaigne, Essays2) Montaigne, Essays3) Machiavelli, Prince
Second Week
1) Machiavelli, Prince2) Machiavelli, Discourses3) Machiavelli, Discourses
Third Week
1) Cervantes, Don Quixote2) Cervantes, Don Quixote3) Cervantes, Don Quixote
Fourth Week
1) Racine, Phædre2) Shakespeare, Hamlet3) Shakespeare, Lear
Fifth Week
1) Shakespeare, Lear2) Shakespeare, Tempest3) Bacon, New Atlantis
Sixth Week
1) Galileo, Two World Systems2) Galileo, Two World Systems3) Descartes, Discourse on Method
Seventh Week
1) Descartes, Discourse on Method2) Descartes, Meditations3) Descartes, Meditations
Eighth Week
1) Hobbes, Leviathan2) Hobbes, Leviathan3) Hobbes, Leviathan
Ninth Week
1) Hobbes, Leviathan2) Pascal, Pensées3) Pascal, Pensées
Tenth Week
1) Vico, The New Science2) Vico, The New Science3) Swift, Gulliver’s Travels
Second Quarter
First Week
1) Locke, Second Treatise2) Locke, Second Treatise3) Locke, Second Treatise
Second Week
1) Montesquieu, Persian Letters2) Montesquieu, Persian Letters3) Hume, Dialogues on Natural Religion
Third Week
1) Hume, Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding2) Hume, Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding3) Hume, Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding
Fourth Week
1) Adam Smith, Wealth of Nations (selections)2) Adam Smith, Wealth of Nations (selections)3) D’Alembert, Preface to L’Encyclopedie
Fifth Week
1) Rousseau, First Discourse2) Rousseau, Second Discourse3) Rousseau, Third Discourse
Sixth Week
1) Rousseau, Emile 12) Rousseau, Emile 23) Rousseau, Emile 3
Seventh Week
1) Rousseau, Emile 42) Rousseau, Emile 53) Rousseau, Social Contract 1
Eighth Week
1) Rousseau, Social Contract 22) Rousseau, Social Contract 3-43) Rousseau, Reveries
Ninth Week
1) Burke, Reflections on the Revolution in France2) Tocqueville, The Ancient Regime and the French Revolution3) Tocqueville, Democracy in America 1
Tenth Week
1) Tocqueville, Democracy in America 12) Tocqueville, Democracy in America 23) Tocqueville, Democracy in America 3
Third Quarter
First Week
1) Kant, Foundation of the Metaphysics of Morals2) Kant, Foundation of the Metaphysics of Morals3) Kant, Critique of Pure Reason (Introduction)
Second Week
1) Goethe, Faust 12) Goethe, Faust 13) Goethe, Faust 2
Third Week
1) Goethe, Faust 22) Hegel, Phenomenology of Mind (selections)3) Hegel, Phenomenology of Mind (selections)
Fourth Week
1) Hegel, Philosophy of History2) Hegel, Philosophy of History3) Hegel, Philosophy of History
Fifth Week
1) Marx, 1844 Manuscripts2) Marx, 1844 Manuscripts3) Marx, German Ideology
Sixth Week
1) Marx, Das Kapital (selections)2) Tolstoy, Anna Karenina3) Tolstoy, Anna Karenina
Seventh Week
1) Tolstoy, Anna Karenina2) Tolstoy, Anna Karenina3) Darwin, Origin of Species
Eighth Week
1) Darwin, Origin of Species2) Nietzsche, Genealogy of Morals3) Nietzsche, Genealogy of Morals
Ninth Week
1) Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil2) Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil3) Nietzsche, Thus Spake Zarathustra (selections)
Tenth Week
1) Weber, Science as a Vocation2) Freud, Civilization and its Discontents3) Heidegger, Letter on Humanism
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