Studying Thucydides in Zimbabwe
I received a nice note from a teacher in Zimbabwe (“somewhat isolated from the academic world,” as they put it) commenting that my posts on Thucydides’ The Peloponnesian War has helped them and it has paid off for their students. That note, along with other nice comments from students reading the book and finding help from my posts, cheer me every time I see them. While the stats are unimpressive to commercial sites or bloggers, I find it astounding that there have been over 300K visits my posts directly about Thucydides’ work. I hope those posts continue to help others working to make sense of a seminal work of literature and one of my favorite books. I’m sure I’ll revisit it and add some more updates since I feel my notes have only scratched the surface of what makes it so original.
I’ll be back after a couple of days, after recovering from exploring Yosemite with my family and then going back to pick up my boys once their three-day class there has finished. Meanwhile, I want to express my gratitude for everyone who has let me know how much those posts have assisted their reading and understanding of Thucydides.
I leave you with how the sky above Half Dome looked yesterday…
Silvia
How wonderful, both, your posts on Thucydides, and the Half Dome. (At a class in our co-op last year, I taught a bit of geography, and this was one of the beauties we learned about with Richard Halliburton's Book of Marvels book.) My daughter had a class on the Punic Wars.
I'll check those posts on Thucydides. How wonderful that Internet can connect us this way. (First time I came to your blog was when looking about English readers of my beloved Galdós.) I have also found kindred spirits who read obscure or not well known classics at Goodreads! (From Galdós to Ortega y Gasset or Emilia Pardo Bazán), it's wonderful.
Dwight
A quick trip back and forth from Yosemite today to pick the boys up…
I'm usually on the receiving end of learning from others, whether half an area code away or half the world away. So it feels really special when others find my scribblings here of use!