Homer, The Iliad

Thucydides, Funeral Oration of Pericles

Three Themes from Sophocles, Antigone

The Apology of Socrates

Apology Chart: Two Levels of Meaning in the Apology

The Republic

Genesis and Exodus

Christianity

The Qur'an

The Prince

Overview

Overview Chart

These notes are meant to help you formulate your own understanding of the texts we study in this course. They are not meant to be a substitute for attending class. Indeed, I very much doubt that they will be useful (or even understandable) to those who have missed class discussion. For they are mostly summaries of the arguments we have discussed together. They do not, however cover all of the topics we may have considered in class. In some cases these notes will look at the texts a little differently than we might have in your class or cover some material that was excluded in your class. This is partly because I teach a number of sections of IH51and the class discussions in these classes differ from each other, sometimes in substantial ways. Moreover, since I am writing or revising these notes after our discussions, I have sometimes found what I now think are better ways to put arguments that I might have presented in a different way in class.

Remember that these notes, like our class discussions, aim not just to report on what the text says but to interpret the text. We are trying both to grasp the intention of the author of the text and to follow the logic of the argument found in the text. Thus we have sometimes gone far to work out what is implicit in or suggested by the text. And, in some cases, we have tried to see how the arguments of the text might be extended to cover circumstances or issues that the text does not explicitly address. I have tried to recall and present some of the alternative interpretations we might have considered in class and give some indication of where the interpretations I have presented differ from the usual scholarly consensus.

Finally, these notes do not often give specific references to the texts. That this is something I do expect from you in your papers and examinations.