Tag: 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.
CATEGORIES
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 …
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 …
May 3, 2019 Thanks to Alissa Simon, HMU Tutor, for today’s post. Last week, I had the opportunity to discuss Molière’s play Tartuffe in a couple of Quarterly Discussions. First of all, I have to admit that I love this play, so my notes may not be altogether unbiased. Having said that, I think that …
August 3, 2018 Thanks to Alissa Simon, HMU Tutor, for today’s post. Each quarter, Harrison Middleton University hosts a Quarterly Discussion. This discussion is open to students and non-students alike. They focus on a short text which everyone reads prior to the discussion. I thoroughly enjoy these because they give me a chance to break …
March 2, 2018 Thanks to James Keller, a 2018 Harrison Middleton University Fellow in Ideas, for today’s post. In leaving Carthage, Augustine abandoned his mother, Monica. A widow, she pleaded with her son not to leave – or, if he must go, not to leave her behind. She would come with him. He lied to …
December 15, 2017 Thanks to Alissa Simon, HMU Tutor, for today’s post. Also, thanks to HMU Tutor Dominique Wagner for a wonderful discussion which resulted in some of the questions posed in today’s blog. “There is hardly any activity, any enterprise, which is started with such tremendous hopes and expectations, and yet, which fails so …
November 17, 2017 Thanks to Alissa Simon, HMU Tutor, for today’s post. This book review was originally published in the November 2017 issue of HMU: Dialogues. Tube Talk, Double Features, and Sound Bites, three new publications from the Great Books Foundation. In February, Harrison Middleton University will cohost the inaugural Southwest Great Books Weekend which …
