I like it Marsha, Bob would like it too. Good spot. QUOTE "Led by the "intellectual Mutt 'n' Jeff act" of former University of Chicago president Robert Hutchins and his sidekick Mortimer Adler. UNQUOTE
Been following a "Chicago thread" for some time Saul Bellow most recently, after Rorty and Pirsig naturally ... must have been something in the Lake Michigan water methinks. Regards Ian On Thu, Jan 15, 2009 at 5:50 PM, MarshaV <[email protected]> wrote: > > This may be of interest. Ignore it if it isn't. > > Book: A Great Idea at the Time: The Rise, Fall, and Curious Afterlife of > the Great Books (Hardcover) > > From Publishers Weekly > Before the dawn of the television age, in an ambitious effort to enlighten > the masses via door-to-door sales, Encyclopedia Britannica and the > University of Chicago launched the Great Books of Western Civilization, "all > fifty-four volumes of them... purporting to encompass all of Western > knowledge from Homer to Freud." Led by the "intellectual Mutt 'n' Jeff act" > of former University of Chicago president Robert Hutchins and his sidekick > Mortimer Adler, the Great Books briefly, and improbably, caught the nation's > imagination. In his discussion, Boston Globe columnist Beam looks at how and > why this multi-year project took shape, what it managed to accomplish (or > not), and the lasting effects it had on college curricula (in the familiar > form of Dead White Males). Beam (Gracefully Insane: Life and Death Inside > America's Premier Mental Hospital) describes meetings endured by the > selection committee, and countless debates over Euripedes, Herodotus, > Shakespeare, Melville, Dickens and Whitman ("When it comes to Great Books, > no one is without an opinion."), but tells it like it is regarding the > Syntopicon they devised-at "3,000 subtopics and 163,000 separate entries, > not exactly a user-friendly compendium"-and the resulting volumes, labeling > them "icons of unreadability-32,000 pages of tiny, double-column, > eye-straining type." By lauding the intent and intelligently critiquing the > outcome, Beam offers an insightful, accessible and fair narrative on the > Great Books, its time, and its surprisingly significant legacy. > > > http://www.amazon.com/Great-Idea-Time-Curious-Afterlife/dp/1586484877/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1232037930&sr=1-1 > > > > > > > > > . > . > The Universe is uncaused, like a net of jewels in which each is a reflection > of all the others in a fantastic, interrelated harmony without end. > . > . > > > Moq_Discuss mailing list > Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. > http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org > Archives: > http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ > http://moq.org.uk/pipermail/moq_discuss_archive/ > Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org.uk/pipermail/moq_discuss_archive/
