Freshman Reading: Homer - Illyad, Odyssey ... ok! if you read the Odyssey in your own native language (not greek), you probably will enjoy it, but how are you going to know about the grand themes unless someone tells you about it?
seems sad in a way that these great works are reduced to a list item
SJC grad here. The Program encourages you to encounter the works for yourself and see what _you_ think the themes/ideas are.
You’re lightly discouraged from reading the translator’s preface, since they share their own opinions. Different students bring different translations of the material, and additionally the language class that lasts all 4 years of undergrad is basically asking what translation is, is it possible.
Background: read both Iliad and odyssey in children's section of library in the 5th grade. Also read most of one of them in an honors philosophy class in college. Can't remember which. Recalled the scene where they were throwing Trojans off the walls after defeating the city when I made a hard tackle in rugby, driving my enemy into the ground.
For that matter, St. John’s students self-select to be the kind of students who would appreciate being guided to discover the major themes. Most other students need to be told them and then think themes are pretentious puffery because they lack the life experience to recognize or appreciate them.
Isn't there a class instruction, supplementary reading, and discussion component for these books? I assume so.
But I think a lot of people — even freshmen! — could just read these books and get something from them anyway.
I'd read _Pride and Prejudice_ many times before the seminar on it, and I could not have predicted what other people saw in the book and wanted to talk about with a pile of postit notes, a ball of red yarn, and ten hours in front of a big wall.