COURSE DESCRIPTION

DEVELOPING THE MODERN MYTHOS

The Heroes Lit and Essay Writing course grew out of my own fascination with how the cultural definition of a great man or woman and what made them great has changed throughout history. How was the Norse culture and mythology influenced by the emergence of Christian culture, and how has that Norse worldview in turn rubbed off on our culture today? What did heroism look like in the 1960s, and what aspects of that are qualities we ought to strive to emulate? How do these ideas relate to a biblical worldview and what does the Bible tell us are heroic qualities? These and more are questions we will look at in this course.

LITERATURE INCLUDED

• Greek myths, retold by Hawthorne and the D'Aulaires
  

• Homer’s Odyssey (approximately half)

• Beowulf (approximately half)

• Norse myths supplemented by selections from Snorri Sturluson’s Prose Edda

• The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood, Howard Pyle

• Fairy tales, comparing Brothers Grimm to modern adaptations

• The Hobbit, Tolkien

• To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee

• Star Wars: Episode IV: viewing to compare as a modern hero tale

CURRICULUM DESIGN

This course includes instruction on how to write a basic five-paragraph essay, including training in thesis, outline, effective introduction and conclusion, and supporting evidence, as well as paragraph-level skills such as varied sentence structure and use of vivid language. Students will discuss literary analysis elements such as theme, characterization, contrast, setting, tone, context, and symbolism. 

A key element of the course is analysis of the worldviews of different cultures and eras, through the heroes they idolized and glorified. We will discuss these worldviews through the lens of a Christian one, while also comparing to our modern American culture and heroes.

Students will write every week. Assignments will include journaling, standard essays, and approach papers (a useful literary analysis exercise we will teach in class).