Category: Virtue
We’re excited that you’ve joined the conversation! At HMU, we want to continue the great authors’ conversations in a contemporary context, and this blog will help us do that. We look back to Aristotle and the early philosophers who used reason and discourse to gain wisdom and now we endeavor to do the same every day.
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November 3, 2023 Thanks to Alissa Simon, HMU Tutor, for today’s post. The October Quarterly Discussion merged two chapters from The Prince by Machiavelli with a chapter from Gibbon’s Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. Of prime interest was the focus on the Roman Emperor Septimius Severus. Machiavelli presents him as a champion of …
October 20, 2023 Thanks to Alissa Simon, HMU Tutor, for today’s post. George Bull translated the Penguin Classics version of Machiavelli’s The Prince (1999). In the introductory materials, Bull notes some of the difficulties of translating Machiavelli’s language. I find his comments particularly enlightening since they also address the problematic nature of virtue. Machiavelli clearly …
September 8, 2023 Thanks to Alissa Simon, HMU Tutor, for today’s post. If it’s been awhile since you have read Machiavelli’s The Prince, you might consider reading an excerpt with us this fall. We will examine two chapters of it in the October Quarterly Discussion. (Reach out to Alissa at as****@hm*.edu for more information). I …
Thanks to Eden Tesfaslassie, a 2022 Fellow in Ideas, for today’s post. May 20, 2022 The main themes the audience sees explored in Akira Kurosawa’s 1950 film Rashōmon are death, truth, and losing faith in humanity. The story conveys this message with the frame of a murder trial, but even by the end of the …
September 10, 2021 Thanks to Alissa Simon, HMU Tutor, for today’s post. “Fools”, said I, “You do not know/ Silence like a cancer grows/ Hear my words that I might teach you/ Take my arms that I might reach you”/ But my words, like silent raindrops fell/ And echoed/ In the wells of silence/ And …
Modern Day Chorus: Lord of the Rings and Ceremony Read More »
May 28, 2021 Thanks to Alissa Simon, HMU Tutor, for today’s post. Pericles, Prince of Tyre: written about 1607, by William Shakespeare”Comus”: written about 1637, by John Milton Last week, I discussed the character of Pericles from Shakespeare’s Pericles, Prince of Tyre. This week, I will continue to explore Shakespeare’s play, but focus on Marina, …
May 21, 2021 Thanks to Alissa Simon, HMU Tutor, for today’s blog. One thing that I love about Shakespeare is his ability to develop rich characters. King Lear, Hamlet, Falstaff, Henry V, Richard II: though problematic, they have vivid internal battles and complex natures. I can imagine Richard lamenting his fallen status on the beach …
April 9, 2021 Thanks to Alissa Simon, HMU Tutor, for today’s post. Today’s post is a brief look at translation and word choice in Thucydides. Both small sections from The History of the Peloponnesian War, Book IV, Chapter XII, furnish a glimpse of the author’s opinion. Though Thucydides set out to write a history of …
July 3, 2020 Thanks to Alissa Simon, HMU Tutor, for today’s post. The authors of the Federalist Papers often cite Plutarch’s Parallel Lives. I, too, am amazed in Plutarch’s broad, holistic analysis of ancient peoples and places. When I first read Plutarch’s works, their current applicability surprised me. I am no longer surprised by this. …
June 19, 2020 Thanks to Alissa Simon, HMU Tutor, for today’s post. Quotes from Percy Bysshe Shelley’s Defence of Poetry (written in 1821) compose the bulk of today’s post. This work eloquently explains the connection between imagination and reality. It also alludes to the idea that poetry is an innate human trait. While I need …
