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Course name
Epic and the Person, Part Two (College Level) with Henry Russell
Recorded course taught by Henry Russell for High School Survey Literature
Category
Literature ➤ Survey Literature
Grade
High School
Semester
Recorded
Summary

This course traces the vision of what it means to be human through the study of the epics of Greece, Rome, and the Catholic world.  The course is designed as a Freshman College course would be, although it has been split into two semesters to make it accessible to 11th and 12th grade students.

Instructor: Dr. Henry Russell

Course Description: The course invites students to explore changing relations between the individual and society in and through classic examples of Western epic.  The Fall’s course readings allowed students to see both continuity and difference in the passage from Greek to Roman epic (e.g., The Iliad and The Aeneid).  This semester we see St. Augustine as he traces his own movement from pagan classical to medieval Christian conceptions of culture, society, and selfhood or soul.  Dante’s Christian masterpiece, The Divine Comedy presents the fullness of the Catholic faith as it is lived or denied.

Instructor Access (Optional grading support) is available for this course. Please note: this is ONLY recommended if you wish to write the optional paper. All quizzes are internally graded in this course. Optional papers will be completed via this page (click here) for an Instructor Access fee of $75.

Special notes

This is Part Two of a two-semester course.

All essays are optional and, if chosen to be done, must be graded by parents.

Total classes

15

Duration

55 minutes

Prerequisites

 Epic and the Person, Part One

Suggested grade level

11th to 12th grade. Advanced 9th and 10th grade students accepted.

Suggested credit

One full semester of Literature. For a full-year credit, precede with Epic and the Person. Part One in the fall.

Outline

Course Outline:

Class One: St. Augustine, Confessions, Bks. 1-2, and Bk. 3, Chapters 1-6

Class Two: St. Augustine, Confessions, Bk. Bk. 3, Chapters 7-12 and Bks. 4-5

Class Three: St. Augustine, Confessions, Bks. 6-7

Class Four: St. Augustine, Confessions, Bks. 8-9

Class Five: Dante, Inferno, Cantos 1-4

Class Six: Dante, Inferno, Cantos 5, 7-10

Class Seven: Dante, Inferno, Cantos 13, 15, 18, 19

Class Eight: Dante, Inferno, Cantos 26-27, 31-34

Class Nine: Dante, Purgatorio, Cantos 1-3, 6

Class Ten: Dante, Purgatorio, Cantos 9-12, 17-18

Class Eleven: Dante, Purgatorio, Cantos 21, 25, 27, 29-31

Class Twelve: Dante, Paradiso, Cantos 1, 3, 5, 6, 7

Class Thirteen: Dante, Paradiso, Cantos 10-12, 14-16

Class Fourteen: Dante, Paradiso, Cantos 20, 23-26

Class Fifteen: Dante, Paradiso, Cantos 28, 30-33

Materials

Homework

Expect to spend two to three hours of reading per class. There will be auto-graded quizzes after each class for immediate feedback as well as OPTIONAL (parent graded) essays and a Final Exam.

Course name
Epic and the Person, Part Two (College Level) with Henry Russell
Instructor
Henry Russell
Semester
Recorded
Category
Literature ➤ Survey Literature
Grade levels
High School
Editors
Sophia Russell, Mary Catherine Russell, Gianna Cunningham
Start time
January 14th, 2025 at 10:00 AM ET
Course type
Recorded, free with subscription
Relative due dates
Relative due dates are disabled for this course.
Enhanced quiz security
Enhanced assignment security

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Henry Russell
maryshire@gmail.com

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About Henry Russell

A graduate of Princeton and South Carolina (MS), Dr. Henry Russell completed his graduate work at Louisiana State University. Formerly the Chairman of Ave Maria College’s Department of Literature, he has also been a professor at Franciscan University of Steubenville and Wake Forest University. He is a founding faculty member of the St. Robert Southwell Creative Writing Workshop held in Mahwah, New Jersey.

Dr. Russell is Headmaster of the St. Augustine’s Homeschool Enrichment Program, which he founded with his wife Crystal. The program began in Fall 2005 with 20 students in two living rooms and now tutors more than 140 students in three locations.

Dr. Russell’s works include The Catholic Shakespeare Audio Series. He was the Associate Editor of The Formalist from 1990-2004 and his writings have been published in various journals. He was honored to edit Dr. Alice von Hildebrand’s groundbreaking volume, The Privilege of Being a Woman.

Click here for more info about Dr. Russell!

See Courses & Videos

  • The Catholic Shakespeare: A Contrast of Kings: Macbeth and Julius Caesar

  • The Catholic Shakespeare: Early and Late Comedies: A Midsummer Night’s Dream and The Tempest

  • The Hobbit or There and Back Again as Gateway to J.R.R.Tolkien

  • The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring

  • The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers

  • The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King

  • Beowulf and Christ

  • Canterbury Tales of Geoffrey Chaucer; Trust God and Tradition

  • The Man Who Was Thursday by Chesterton (Modern Catholic Classics Series)

  • The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis (Modern Catholic Classics Series)

  • Homer’s Odyssey; The Soul of Pre-Socratic Wisdom

  • The Iliad: Glory and the Will of God

  • King Arthur and Christ: Heroism and Holiness

  • Medieval Literature for Modern Catholics

  • Scarlet Letter

  • Sir Gawain and the Green Knight; Chivalry, Courtesy and Chastity

  • Sophocles and Tragedy

  • Virgil’s Aeneid: The Founding of Nations in the Will of God

  • Death Comes for the Archbishop (American Classics Series)

  • Redemptive Comedy of Flannery O’Connor (American Classics Series) 

  • Inferno (Hell) by Dante

  • Purgatorio (Purgatory) by Dante

  • Dante’s Paradiso (Heaven)

© 2025 Homeschool Connections; Henry Russell. All Rights Reserved.

  • This material is only to be used for its intended purpose by active subscribers of Homeschool Connections or purchasers of the course. Any other use without explicit permission is in violation of the seventh commandment, and in violation of US and International copyright laws.
  • You may print or download to your own storage extracts for your personal homeschool and non-commercial use only. Use for homeschool co-ops is permitted after contacting customer support and receiving written permission from Homeschool Connections.
  • Upon completion of the course, you must delete all copies of course materials from any storage on which you saved permissible extracts.

Violation of the above copyright policies may result in expulsion without any refund and/or legal action.