The course shows how the narrative and symbolic structure of myths orders individual and communal experience. The myths that have influenced Western civilization receive special emphasis. The course will illuminate the cultural, social, and political life in Ancient Greece. This course examines the transmission of Greco-Roman culture in circumstances radically different from those in which it originated. It highlights the aspects of classical culture most influential in forming the Western tradition.
Special attention is paid to the literature and thought of the period.
An examination of the collapse of the Roman Republic and the development of the Imperial government under Augustus. The paradox of the external power and inner instability of Rome. The rise and fall of the Hellenistic states from the death of Alexander the Great until the Roman conquest, with political emphasis on the development of the monarchies and cultural emphasis on the Hellenization of the East. The nature and significance of the epic hero. Epic as code and as critique of tradition.