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The Great Courses

Elizabeth Vandiver

Classical Mythology Audio CD – Unabridged, January 1, 2002

by Elizabeth Vandiver (Author)

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12 Audio CDs (24 lectures, 30 minutes/lecture) Course Lecture Titles 1. Introduction 2. What Is Myth? 3. Why Is Myth? 4. "First Was Chaos" 5. The Reign of the Olympians 6. Immortals and Mortals 7. Demeter, Persephone, and the Conquest of Death 8. The Eleusinian Mysteries and the Afterlife 9. Apollo and Artemis 10. Hermes and Dionysos 11. Laughter-Loving Aphrodite 12. Culture, Prehistory, and the "Great Goddess" 13. Humans, Heroes, and Half-Gods 14. Theseus and the "Test-and-Quest" Myth 15. From Myth to History and Back Again 16. The Greatest Hero of All 17. The Trojan War 18. The Terrible House of Atreus 19. Blood Vengeance, Justice, and the Furies 20. The Tragedies of King Oedipus 21. Monstrous Females and Female Monsters 22. Roman Founders, Roman Fables 23. "Gods Are Useful" 24. From Ovid to the Stars

Language

English
Publisher

The Teaching Co.
Publication date

January 1, 2002
ISBN-10

1565850378
ISBN-13

978-1565852921
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Thomas Childers
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Product details

ASIN ‏ : ‎ 1565852923
Publisher ‏ : ‎ The Teaching Co. (January 1, 2002)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1565850378
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1565852921
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 15.2 ounces

Best Sellers Rank: #1,693,272 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #10,527 in Books on CD

Customer Reviews:
12 ratings

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The Great Courses
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It all began with just a few videotapes—and a brilliant inspiration.
Tom Rollins, the founder of The Great Courses, was a law student at Harvard University and was facing an important exam on the U.S. Federal Rules of Evidence—an exam for which he wasn't prepared.
Dreading the notoriously boring subject but knowing his success depended on understanding the material, Rollins obtained videotapes of 10 lectures by a noted authority on the subject, Professor Irving Younger. Rollins planted himself in front of his television late at night and put the first tape into his VCR. What he discovered changed his life.
The tapes were unlike anything Rollins had experienced in his Harvard lecture halls. Professor Younger's lectures were outrageously insightful, impressively thorough, and engagingly witty. Most important: They hammered home the concepts in a way that made the subject both accessible and interesting. They made learning not a chore to be accomplished but an adventure to be experienced.
Rollins played all 10 hours of those lectures nearly nonstop. A few days later he passed his exam and went on to make an "A" in the course.
He never forgot the unique power of recorded lectures by a great teacher—the way that a bright mind could ignite a passion for lifelong learning. And years later, in 1990, Rollins founded The Great Courses to share that unforgettable experience with the rest of the world.
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Elizabeth Vandiver
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Tom

Good presentation

Reviewed in the United States on May 20, 2013

Verified Purchase

Dr. Vandiver does a good job explaining classical mythology. This is a "deep" lecture, at least in my opinion. She doesn't spend quite as much time as I would have liked discussing individual myth. Instead she delves into the meanings behind the myths. An understanding of Greek/Roman culture is required to understand these meanings and I believe Dr. Vandiver provides the background that is needed. She can be a little dry at times, but, having spent a lot of time in college classrooms, I had no problem with her delivery. Interesting and informative. Plan on buying some of her other lectures.

Reviewed in the United States on February 1, 2019

Verified Purchase

Never have an English major talk about mythology.... yuck!

Reviewed in the United States on November 7, 2019

Verified Purchase

The very best. Informative and fun - a wonderful professor.

Reviewed in the United States on September 6, 2012

Verified Purchase

Very informative and easy to follow. More than I had expected for the money. The lectures not only covered the well know myths but explained how they may have become myths.

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douglas nadler

Five Stars

Reviewed in the United States on June 29, 2014

thanks.

Fantastic professor makes learning a treat!

Reviewed in the United States on October 9, 2017

I listened to this lecture series in the car with my 8th grader, having enjoyed Vandiver's Herodotus course with her last year. We very much enjoy Vandiver's pacing and rhythm. Each lecture lasts about half an hour, which is just long enough for us to get from home to an appointment. She briefly covers the meat of a myth (this is not a story-telling series) and then delves into what that myth might tell us about the people and culture of the time in which these myths were accepted as religious truth. My daughter has a deep thirst for mythology and has a pretty good knowledge of the mythological world from Riordan's novels, which prompted further research after laying a good foundation. Now, with that framework, we listened to this series which dissects the myth to teach us about the thinking, the psychology, and the sociology of the time period when they were prevalent.

Having not studied mythology myself, I found much of the material brand new, and would probably recommend reading an actual telling of the myths before listening to this series (unless you're not interested in a comprehensive study). I definitely came away feeling that I'd only grazed some of the stories that are out there, but I enjoyed the deep dive into those that we did touch on.

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S. Usami

An excellent reference point for a vast body of works

Reviewed in the United States on January 15, 2014

I saw Hercules cartoons as a child and throughout my upbringing I have seen countless renditions of Atlas, Hermes, Athene, Aphrodite, Zeus, and others in movies and comic books, the most recent set being the Percy Jackson movies. I have read the Iliad and The Odyssey, and I have read some plays by Aeschylus. But there are so many tellings and re-tellings of these stories that it's hard to reconcile what "really" happened to a god/hero/person, and it's sometimes hard to tell if the "Leda and the Swan" Zeus portrayed by Cezanne is meant to be the same person played by Rip Torn in Disney's "Hercules". You can't even grok Frankenstein -- "the modern Prometheus" -- without knowing something about Greek mythology. Where to begin?

So it came as a pleasant surprise that, as I began listening to this lecture series, Prof. Vandiver opens the discussion with "what is myth" and sets up operational definitions about what we're saying is myth, legend, or folklore. She then explains the schools of thought behind a myth -- whether or not we should view mythology to include any-and-all versions of the stories, or should we point to a single version as being authoritative?

I don't want to rehash the syllabus, which can be found elsewhere, but I want to tell you my general thoughts as I am learning this material.

Vandiver is concise, thoughtful, and thorough. She presents the stories from Hesiod's Theogony, Homeric Hymns (and what those are), and the connection they have with Sumerian and Roman mythology. You get a picture of the Ancient Greek mindset and moral codes. She discusses archaeological findings and how they relate to what we know or don't yet know. I very much appreciated that the lesson incorporated these facets. This course is a history lesson, sociology lesson, and a cultural literacy lesson all rolled into a fun stroll through outrageous stories from antiquity.

Prof. Vandiver presents opposing schools of thought and tells you which one she chooses to side with, without saying that either side is wrong or mistaken. She tells you what is known, and what is not known in a way that feels logical and sensitive. She has a palpable love for her subject matter, which comes through in a variety of ways. She explains the Minoan snake goddess and the bull-leaping frescoes with a sense of wonder and adoration, while being very clear to the listener that there is only so much that we can know about them at this time.

The audio download from the TTC web site is $35 right now (regularly $130). This course is the new center of my understanding of classical mythology, and I am going to listen to Prof. Vandiver's other lectures (Iliad, Odyssey, Aeneid) next. I have no doubt that she will open up new lines of understanding for me, while reinforcing my sense of wonder and love for these classics.

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Thomas W. Sulcer

Excellent lectures from a skilled teacher

Reviewed in the United States on April 8, 2010

Elizabeth Vandiver is a superb teacher and scholar of Classics whose enthusiasm for Greek and Roman mythology is catchy. And her CD-audio lectures are terrific for listening in the car while driving, or playing in a boombox at home. It's the perfect college experience -- no grades, no tests, no tuition, no papers to write -- but the beauty of the course is there. What's great is these professors are carefully selected not only for their expertise, but for their teaching skill, so it is like the company advertises -- the best college classrooms in the world. Vandiver is an expert in mythology, Greek culture, and knows the Greek language as well, so she can explain difficult concepts such as dactylic hexameter. Almost all Teaching Company courses are top notch, and Vandiver is one of the best of the best.

-- Thomas W. Sulcer
Author of "The Second Constitution of the United States"
(free on web; google title + Sulcer)

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Classical Mythology Audio CD – Unabridged, January 1, 2002

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