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A Dominican-born academic tells the story of how the Great Books transformed his life—and why they have the power to speak to people of all backgrounds. What is the value of a liberal education? Traditionally characterized by a rigorous engagement with the classics of Western thought and literature, this approach to education is all but extinct in American universities, replaced by flexible distribution requirements and ever-narrower academic specialization. Many academics attack the very idea of a Western canon as chauvinistic, while the general public increasingly doubts the value of the humanities. In Rescuing Socrates, Dominican-born American academic Roosevelt Montás tells the story of how a liberal education transformed his life, and offers an intimate account of the relevance of the Great Books today, especially to members of historically marginalized communities.Montás emigrated from the Dominican Republic to Queens, New York, when he was twelve and encountered the Western classics as an undergraduate in Columbia University’s renowned Core Curriculum, one of America’s last remaining Great Books programs. The experience changed his life and determined his career—he went on to earn a PhD in English and comparative literature, serve as director of Columbia’s Center for the Core Curriculum, and start a Great Books program for low-income high school students who aspire to be the first in their families to attend college.Weaving together memoir and literary reflection, Rescuing Socrates describes how four authors—Plato, Augustine, Freud, and Gandhi—had a profound impact on Montás’s life. In doing so, the book drives home what it’s like to experience a liberal education—and why it can still remake lives.

Yachting. --- Sailing. --- Pilot guides. --- Nautical charts. --- Pilot guides --- Nautical charts --- Sailing --- Yachting --- South Australia. --- Books and reading --- Education, Humanistic --- United States --- Intellectual life. --- Canon (Literature) --- Learning and scholarship. --- Sociological aspects.. --- History and criticism. --- Montás, Roosevelt --- Books and reading. --- Appraisal of books --- Books --- Choice of books --- Evaluation of literature --- Literature --- Reading, Choice of --- Reading and books --- Reading habits --- Reading public --- Reading --- Reading interests --- Reading promotion --- Appraisal --- Evaluation --- Adoption. --- Africa. --- Analogy. --- Archival research. --- Aristotle. --- British subject. --- Bullshit. --- Celibacy. --- Censure. --- Charles Darwin. --- Circular reasoning. --- Civil disobedience. --- Classroom. --- Concept. --- Connotation. --- Conscience. --- Consciousness. --- Consent of the governed. --- Conspiracy theory. --- Core Curriculum (Columbia College). --- Criticism. --- Crito. --- Curfew. --- Curriculum. --- Disgust. --- Doomsday cult. --- Economics. --- Education. --- Emma Goldman. --- Ethnic group. --- Eudaimonia. --- Far-right politics. --- Free association (psychology). --- Friedrich Nietzsche. --- Graduate school. --- Great books. --- Health insurance. --- Hostos Community College. --- Humanities. --- Ignorance. --- Individual psychology. --- Institution. --- Intellect. --- Intelligentsia. --- International student. --- Irony. --- Jacques Barzun. --- Jean-Martin Charcot. --- Justification (theology). --- Lecture. --- Liberal arts education. --- Liberal democracy. --- Liberal education. --- Literature. --- Macbeth. --- Mahadev Desai. --- Mahatma Gandhi. --- Masculinity. --- Motivation. --- New Space (Uruguay). --- Nonviolence. --- Of Education. --- Originality. --- Philosophy. --- Physicist. --- Piety. --- Pontius Pilate. --- Popularity. --- Privilege (social inequality). --- Proselytism. --- Psychoanalysis. --- Psychologist. --- Psychology. --- Radicalization. --- Religion in South Africa. --- Religion. --- Religious experience. --- Renunciation. --- Resentment. --- Scholarship. --- Secondary education. --- Secular humanism. --- Self-concept. --- Self-denial. --- Self-knowledge (psychology). --- Social contract. --- Spiritual autobiography. --- Spirituality. --- Symptom. --- The Islamist. --- The Wealth of Nations. --- Thought. --- Thucydides. --- To This Day. --- Towel. --- Transcendentalism. --- Universalism. --- Untouchability. --- Wakefulness. --- Yale Law School.