The Art of Meaning Making Or, How are We to Live?
Jack Calder
INTRODUCTION
This course is a survey of some of the greatest thinkers and writers ever produced by humanity. Each of them attends, in their own way, to the question of meaning. What is meaning? How do we create meaning? How can we live meaningful lives? In this course students will engage deeply with these fundamental questions. We will embark on an intense close reading of each of these texts, examining how they seek to create and communicate meaning. As the course progresses, we will build an understanding of these texts as a dialogue; a conversation on the condition of humanity. Students will gain skills in reading, writing, and thinking well. They will be pushed to develop and communicate complex concepts, forming their own notions of life in the process. These skills will form an excellent basis for college studies, where students will be forced to confront and understand very sophisticated texts. Through this course, they will learn not just how to understand the concepts expressed, but also how to interrogate these concepts, develop their own response, and communicate this response in writing and speaking. Most importantly, this knowledge will form the basis for a rich and fulfilling life. In mastering the art of creating meaning, students learn the art of living well.
READINGS
DAY 1 – Thing Poems
READING 1
In a Station of the Metro – Ezra Pound
READING 2
The Panther – Rainer Maria Rilke
Black Cat – Rainer Maria Rilke
*** OPTIONAL ***
Before Summer Rain; Faded; Spanish Dancer; The Carousel; The Grownup; Archaic Torso of Apollo – Rainer Maria Rilke
Ode to a Grecian Urn; To Autumn – Keats
The Fish – Elizabeth Bishop
ASSIGNMENT: Write a thing poem
Day 2 – Writing with Things
WRITING 1
Writing Thing Poems
READING 3
The Cares of a Family Man – Franz Kafka
Day 3 – Away from Things; Into Ideas
WRITING 2
Poem Sharing and Analysis
READING 4
Excerpts from The Republic – Plato
*** OPTIONAL ***
Orpheus, Hermes, Eurydice – Rainer Maria Rilke The Right Use of School Studies – Simone Weil
Assignment: Take an argument in either Plato or Boethius, and analyze it logically into premises and conclusions. Attempt to criticize the argument in terms of either validity or soundness.
Day 4 – The Consolations of Philosophy
READING 5
The Consolation of Philosophy, Book III – Boethius
WRITING 3
Arguments: Logic and Image
Day 5 – Away from Ideas; Into Life
READING 6
The Problem of Socrates; How the ‘True World’ Finally Became a Fable – Friedrich Nietzsche
WRITING 4
Arguments: Analytics and Ends
ASSIGNMENT: Choose a particular “exchange” from Waiting for Godot and analyze it
Day 6 – Life and Death
READING 7
Waiting for Godot – Samuel Beckett
READING 8
Waiting for Godot – Samuel Beckett
*** OPTIONAL ***
Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow – William Shakespeare
Day 7 – The Saved and the Drowned: A Negative Ethics
WRITING 5
Reading and analyzing our “Exchange” essays
READING 9
The Saved and the Drowned – Primo Levi
FINAL ASSIGNMENT: Elaborate on the analysis you began w/ the first Godot Essay
Day 8 – Ethics and Politics
READING 10
Politics I.1-7 – Aristotle
READING 11
Politics I.1-7 – Aristotle
Day 9 – Politics
READING 12
What is the Third Estate? – Emmanuel Joseph Sieyes
READING 13
To Posterity – Bertolt Brecht
Day 10 – A Gesture at More
READING 14
Letters to a Young Poet I – Rainer Maria Rilke
WRITING 6
Final Presentations
GRADING
Class Participation – 50% Writings – 50%