Explore with Joseline Yu the dangerous games played to test a knight's virtue in the Middle English romance poem "Sir Gawain and the Green Knight," as part of the Western Canon Book Club series. In place of fights to the death that readers of older epic poetry are familiar with, games are played in "Sir…
Plagues, sexual taboo, war, ecstatic violence, and the cost of self-knowledge – join Thomas Arnold for the first in this series on Reading Greek Tragedy for a World on Fire, where we will probe the voices and technologies of Greek tragedy for our current moment. The first salon will delve into questions of what Greek …
Writer Henry Oliver joins the Western Canon Book Club series for a salon about three unusual Shakespearean kings. What do Hamlet, Prospero, and Richard III have in common? They are…
Writer Henry Oliver continues the Western Canon Book Club series with a salon about the birth of Romanticism. Shakespeare's biggest influence was on the Romantics, the two generations of European…
Join Maya Henry for a conversation about her newest novel, "Looking Forward," which explores themes of love, fame, and personal growth. This event is hosted by writer Sherry Ning. Join…
Hey, Toronto and GTA! We’re have an August meetup, hosted by Ben Parry. It’s a great opportunity to meet others based in Toronto, learn about some of the amazing projects going on in the city, make new friends, and engage in stimulating discussions. The theme will be: The Literary Life. What role do books and…
Ada Palmer's Terra Ignota series is a masterpiece of utopian worldbuilding. The author is a historian and professor of Renaissance, Enlightenment, and Humanist studies, and she uses those ideals to build a vast and beautiful future. Let's talk about each element of the Terra Ignota world, compare them to those Enlightenment ideals of the past, and discuss…
In her debut salon, interviewer and recent NYU MFA grad, Rashida Ashley, will speak with guest Chloe Faith Robinson, to discuss how literary lovers can obtain book blurbs, book reviews,…
Writer Henry Oliver continues the Western Canon Book Club series with a salon about the birth of Romanticism. Turgenev's greatest novel is one of the greatest Russian novels of the…
Hollywood screenwriter Michael Sonnenschein, The Common Reader essayist, literary critic, and Second Act: What Late Bloomers Can Tell You About Success and Reinventing Your Life writer Henry Oliver, and former screenwriter-playwright and now…
In this first salon, we will be discussing the book at a meta level. We will be discussing the author, George Saunders, the introduction to the book, and if we…
Join Charlene Putney to delve into the life of Ivan Denisovich as we continue our trip down Western Canon Book Club series. This is the perfect book club read: it's short, snappy, and life-changing - what more could you want from a winter book?! Our hero, Ivan Denisovich Shukhov, is an innocent prisoner sentenced to…
