Does this make me a nerd?

I began my self-guided education journey at the foundations of the Western world because if you’re going to do this sort of thing, you might as well start at the beginning. Classical education is rooted in ancient Greek and Roman philosophy, and as a lover of literature, I knew these were the texts I wanted to spend more time with. Sadly, I never had the chance to study classical education in any formal way, so I decided to fix that myself. I did myself a favor and combined reading material from the Great Books and classical education into my own personalized self-guided study plan.

One of the reasons I love literature is that it lets me listen in on a conversation that’s been going on for centuries. The Great Books are all busy discussing big ideas, and I get to pull up a chair and eavesdrop. So far, the first conversation I’ve been listening in on this year has been between Aristotle’s Poetics and Homer’s The Iliad.

Originally, I didn’t plan to read these two at the same time. I had them neatly sorted into different periods and fully intended to read Poetics after The Iliad. But my impatient nature got the better of me. Poetics arrived in the mail first, and rather than wait like a reasonable person, I started reading it immediately. Turns out, this minor lapse in self-control worked out beautifully.

Reading Aristotle and Homer side by side has been an absolute delight. In Poetics, Aristotle lays out what he believes makes a great tragedy or epic, including its structure, language, and content. And as he does, I get to watch those ideas play out on the pages of The Iliad. Aristotle even uses Homer repeatedly as his prime example, pointing to both The Iliad and The Odyssey as models of excellent storytelling.

How cool is it that we get to eavesdrop on a conversation this good?