Medea is an ancient Greek tragedy written by Euripides, based upon the myth of Jason and Medea and first produced in 431 BC. The plot centers on the actions of Medea, a former princess of the "barbarian" kingdom of Colchis, and the wife of Jason; she finds her position in the Greek world threatened as Jason leaves her for a Greek princess of Corinth. Medea takes vengeance on Jason by murdering Jason's new wife as well as her own children, after which she escapes to Athens to start a new life.

For thousands of years, Homer's ancient epic poem the

Iliad has enchanted readers from around the world. When you join Professor Vandiver for this lecture series on the Iliad, you'll come to understand what has enthralled and gripped so many people. Her compelling 12-lecture look at this literary masterpiece -whether it's the work of many authors or the "vision" of a single blind poet - makes it vividly clear why, after almost 3,000 years, the

Iliad remains not only among the greatest adventure stories ever told but also one of the most compelling meditations on the human condition ever written.

In The Oresteia, Aeschylus dramatizes the myth of the curse on the royal house of Argos. The action begins when King Agamemnon returns victorious from the Trojan War, only to be treacherously slain by his own wife. It ends with the trial of their son, Orestes, who slew his mother to avenge her treachery - a trial with the goddess Athena as judge, the god Apollo as defense attorney, and, as prosecutors, relentless avenging demons called The Furies.

Seeking to depose his brother Artaxerxes and take his place upon the Persian throne, Cyrus the Younger leads the 10,000 mercenaries on a dangerous campaign deep into the heart of Persia. There, Cyrus is killed and his generals overthrown, leaving a young Xenophon to lead the army on its treacherous journey home. Snowy mountains, wide rivers, violent blizzards, and hostile tribes obstruct their way, testing Xenophon's leadership and his soldiers' perseverance to the extreme.

In Sophocles' tragedy, Oedipus discovers that he has been caught in his terrible destiny, unknowingly murdering his father and marrying his mother.

The Hellenica is Xenophon’s continuation of Thucydides’ history of the Peloponnesian War, literally resuming from where the previous author’s history was abruptly left unfinished and narrating the events of the final seven years of the conflict and the war’s aftermath. Some historians consider the Hellenica to be a personal work, written by Xenophon in retirement on his Spartan estate, and intended primarily for circulation among his friends, who would have known the main protagonists and events, having most likely participated in them.

Beyond the rehashed clichés, this book inspires us to rediscover Diogenes' philosophical legacy—whether it be the challenge to the established order, the detachment from materialism, the choice of a return to nature, or the formulation of a cosmopolitan ideal strongly rooted in the belief that virtue is better revealed in action than in theory.

Under the order of King Pelias, Jason embarks on a perilous journey to steal the Golden Fleece from the Land of Colchis. Far from heroic, Jason is the typical everyman. Often compared with Homer's Iliad and Odyssey, Jason and the Argonauts is the only surviving poem from the Hellenistic period and was hugely influential on later literature, especially the Roman poetry of Virgil and Ovid.

Perhaps no other Biblical tale penetrates so deeply into the everyday travails of the common person as The Book of Job. It tells the story of a righteous man beset by torment and misfortune through no fault of his own. This parable of bad things happening to a good person addresses the eternal question of why we are here, and why we suffer. This translation is by Stephen Mitchell.

The Theogony (composed c. 700 BC) is a poem by Hesiod (8th-7th century BC) describing the origins and genealogies of the Greek gods. A theogony is a part of Greek mythology which attempts to articulate reality as a whole. Hesiod's work is a synthesis of various local Greek traditions concerning the gods, organized as a narrative that tells of their origin and how they established control over the Cosmos.

Composed toward the end of the first millennium, Beowulf is the elegiac narrative of the adventures of Beowulf, a Scandinavian hero who saves the Danes from the seemingly invincible monster Grendel and, later, from Grendel's mother. He then returns to his own country and dies in old age in a vivid fight against a dragon. The poem is about encountering the monstrous, defeating it, and then having to live on in the exhausted aftermath.

For nearly three thousand years, Helen of Troy has been both the embodiment of absolute female beauty and a reminder of the terrible power that it can wield. Held responsible for both the Trojan War and enduring the enmity between East and West, for millennia she has been viewed as an exquisite agent of extermination. But who was she really? Focusing on the 'real' Helen, bestselling historian Bettany Hughes reconstructs the true life for this elusive Green Bronze age princess and places her alongside the heroes and heroines of myth and history.

Seventeen years ago, King Odysseus sailed to war with Troy, taking with him every man of fighting age from the island of Ithaca. None of them has returned, and the women of Ithaca have been left behind to run the kingdom. Penelope was barely into womanhood when she wed Odysseus. While he lived, her position was secure. But now, years on, speculation is mounting that her husband is dead, and suitors are beginning to knock at her door. No one man is strong enough to claim Odysseus' empty throne—not yet.

Nationally bestselling author of Daughters of Sparta Claire Heywood returns with an imaginative and female-centered reinterpretation of the myth of the great hero Perseus, told through the voices of three women who are sidelined in the traditional version—his mother, Danae; his trophy, Medusa; and his wife, Andromeda—but whose viewpoints reveal a man who is not, in fact, a hero at all.

Aristotle said that philosophy begins with wonder, and the first Western philosophers developed theories of the world which express simultaneously their sense of wonder and their intuition that the world should be comprehensible. But their enterprise was by no means limited to this proto-scientific task. Through, for instance, Heraclitus's enigmatic sayings, the poetry of Parmenides and Empedocles, and Zeno's paradoxes, the Western world was introduced to metaphysics, rationalist theology, ethics, and logic.

We live in an era rife with cultural conflict. The 21st century is by no means free of wars, terrorism, riots, famine, nor epidemics. We may attempt to solve the challenges of our times by uniting the humanistic disciplines of philosophy, science, and technology. Our modern reality requires a fundamental understanding of the problems beleaguering our existence. Science and literature are key tools for gaining this insight. The wisdom accumulated throughout the centuries by scientists, philosophers, and writers is a solid foundation on which modern man can build the future.

The classic trilogy about murder, revenge and justice, as heard on BBC Radio 3 – plus a bonus documentary exploring Aeschylus's seminal Greek tragedy. A chilling tale of homecoming, violent death and bloody vengeance, The Oresteia dates back to the fifth century BC, but its themes still resonate today. At once a family saga, morality tale and courtroom drama, it recounts how two generations of the cursed House of Atreus become locked into a deadly cycle of atrocities....

In The Oresteia, Aeschylus dramatizes the myth of the curse on the royal house of Argos. The action begins when King Agamemnon returns victorious from the Trojan War, only to be treacherously slain by his own wife. It ends with the trial of their son, Orestes, who slew his mother to avenge her treachery - a trial with the goddess Athena as judge, the god Apollo as defense attorney, and, as prosecutors, relentless avenging demons called The Furies.

This collection contains the following works: Medea by Sophocles Antigone by Sophocles Agamemnon by Aeschylus Eumenides by Aeschylus The Choephori by Aeschylus The Tragedy of Othello, the Moor of Venice by William Shakespeare The Tragedy of Romeo And Juliet by William Shakespeare The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark by William Shakespeare The Tragedy of Macbeth by William Shakespeare A Midsummer Night's Dream by William Shakespeare The Tragedy of King Lear by William Shakespeare The Tragedy of Antony and Cleopatra by William Shakespeare.

This collection presents the works of the three fathers of ancient Greek tragedies: Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides. The reader of this collection will be able to comprehend how the plots and conflicts populating classical tragedy developed. The principle theme of Aeschylus' tragedies is the idea of fate being omnipotent and the futility in struggling against it. The tragedies of Sophocles reflect the era of the Greeks' victorious war against the Persians, which opened up commercial prosperity through trade.

The Oresteia is a tragedy in three parts written by Aeschylus in the fifth century BCE. After a decade of warfare, Troy had fallen and Agamemnon, King of Mycenae, returned home. His wife, Queen Clytemnestra, had him killed to avenge the sacrifice of her daughter Iphigenia, to obtain the crown and to marry her lover Aegisthus. This murder leads to further bloodshed when their son Orestes in turn kills Clytemnestra and Aegisthus. The trilogy consists of Agamemnon, The Libation Bearers, and The Eumenides.

This collection contains the following works: Euripides: Medea Sophocles: Antigone Aeschylus: Agamemnon Aeschylus: Eumenides Aeschylus: The Choephori William Shakespeare: The Tragedy of Othello, the Moor of Venice William Shakespeare: The Tragedy of Romeo And Juliet William Shakespeare: The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark, William Shakespeare: The Tragedy of Macbeth, William Shakespeare: A Midsummer Night's Dream, William Shakespeare: The Tragedy of King Lear, William Shakespeare: Antony and Cleopatra.

The Greek poet, Hesiod, stands out as the first personality in European literature. The Theogony contains a genealogy of the gods from the beginning of time and an account of their violent struggles before the present order was established. The Works and Days, a compendium of advice for a life of honest husbandry, shines a unique and fascinating light on archaic Greek society, ethics, and superstition. Hesiod's poetry is the oldest source of the myths of Prometheus, Pandora, and the Golden Age.

The ancient Greek poet Hesiod lived around the same time as Homer. He is considered to be an economist and also wrote works on mythology, ancient time-keeping, and farming techniques. The Hesiod Collection includes The Shield of Heracles, Theogony (the origins and genealogies of the Greek gods), and Works and Days (a farmer’s almanac in which Hesiod instructs his brother Perses in the art of agriculture).

Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey are unquestionably two of the greatest epic masterpieces in Western literature. Though more than 2,700 years old, their stories of brave heroics, capricious gods, and towering human emotions are vividly timeless. The Iliad can justly be called the world’s greatest war epic. The terrible and long-drawn-out siege of Troy remains one of the classic campaigns. The Odyssey chronicles the many trials and adventures Odysseus must pass through on his long journey home from the Trojan wars to his beloved wife.

Antigone, daughter of Jocasta and Oedipus, faces great challenges when she must arrange a formal burial for her brother, Polynices. This rendition of Antigone by Sophocles is of the highest-caliber audio. It's completely unabridged. Enjoy the classic story of Antigone narrated to perfection.

Nearly three thousand years after they were composed, The Iliad and The Odyssey remain two of the most celebrated and widely read stories ever told, yet next to nothing is known about their author. He was certainly an accomplished Greek bard, and he probably lived in the late eighth and early seventh centuries BCE Authorship is traditionally ascribed to a blind poet named Homer, and it is under this name that the works are still published.

The Theogony "the genealogy or birth of the gods" is a poem by Hesiod (8th – 7th century BC) describing the origins and genealogies of the Greek gods, composed c. 730–700 BC. It is written in the Epic dialect of Ancient Greek and contains 1022 lines. Hesiod's Theogony is a large-scale synthesis of a vast variety of local Greek traditions concerning the gods, organized as a narrative that tells how they came to be and how they established permanent control over the cosmos. It is the first known Greek mythical cosmogony.

Euripides's play follows the fates of the women of Troy after their city has been sacked, their husbands killed, and their remaining families taken away as slaves. It serves as an anti-war narrative as it highlights the suffering of the women left behind. The tragedy also calls attention to how women were treated as commodities in the past by showing how they were divided among the remaining men as spoils of war.

For thousands of years, Homer's ancient epic poem the

Iliad has enchanted readers from around the world. When you join Professor Vandiver for this lecture series on the Iliad, you'll come to understand what has enthralled and gripped so many people. Her compelling 12-lecture look at this literary masterpiece -whether it's the work of many authors or the "vision" of a single blind poet - makes it vividly clear why, after almost 3,000 years, the

Iliad remains not only among the greatest adventure stories ever told but also one of the most compelling meditations on the human condition ever written.