Gateway to the Great Books Volume 1: Introduction and Syntopical Guide

About the Authors

Robert M Hutchins

Robert M Hutchins (1899-1977) was an American educational philosopher. He was the 5th president of the University of Chicago and an earlier dean of Yale Law School. Hutchins became one of the most influential members of the school of secular perennialism. (Educational perennialism is a normative educational philosophy. Perennializes believe that the priority of education should be to teach principles that have persisted for centuries, not facts). Hutchins served as editor in chief of both the Great Books of the Western World and Gateway to the Great Books. According to Hutchins:

The object of the educational system, taken as a whole, is not to produce hands for industry or to teach the young how to make a living. It is to produce responsible citizens. 

Hutchins argues that education had become a poor trade school, a daycare, and a place to for young adults to learn to adjust socially to the world as it is rather than to be truly educated.  

Mortimer J Adler

Mortimer Jerome Adler was an American philosopher, educator, encyclopedist, author, and lay theologian. His philosophical work was situated within the Aristotelian and Thomistic traditions. He taught at Columbia University and the University of Chicago. Following the success of a Great Books seminar that influenced University of Chicago trustee and businessman Walter Paepcke, Paepcke founded the Aspen Institute. 

A Letter to the Reader

In A Letter to the Reader, Robert M Hutchins makes the case for reading The Great Books of the Western World and The Gateway to the Great Books:

The offerings we present to you here are intended to lead you on, to fortify you, to encourage you, to seduce you into the habit of reading, and in particular the habit of reading the Great Books of the Western World. 

In the letter, Hutchins argues against the common complaints, such as "Too hard", "Too dull", and "What good is it?", of those who refuse to read the great books. Hutchins laments the "fun society" of 50s/60s America, and he asks the question: what really is fun? After asking this question, Hutchins argues that the cheap fun of the television set eventually becomes monotonous, and he claims that because what separates man from beast is his mind and because "all men by nature desire to know", that "the greatest human fun is that of discovery. Discovery is a synonym for learning". While reading can be boring, the only thing that keeps "reading from being boring is learning, the discovery of possible worlds".  

After giving his argument for why the reader should read the Great Books, Hutchins lambasts the state of education in America. His critique of the state of education in America can basically be summarized by his educational perennialism:

The object of formal, institutional education must be to develop the habits that promote and sustain the life of the mind.  

 Introduction

In the Introduction to the Gateway to the Great Books, Adler starts off by explaining why the books included in the Gateway and Great Books sets were chosen, and then he gives some advice on reading the different kinds of material that are included in each set. Adler finishes by diving deeper into each of the kinds of books that are included in the set and explaining the themes and questions that will be explored by the different kinds of works.

The works included in the GBWW (Great Books of the Western World) "not only have a certain magnitude, but they also occupy a unique place in the formation and development of Western culture. Each of them represents a primary, original, and fundamental contribution to man's understanding of the universe and of himself." Meanwhile, the works included in the Gateway "not only lack the magnitude of the great books; they also have less seminal power". Adler argues that because the Gateway selections are shorter and easier to read, they will serve as an effective introduction to the Great Books series. 

Different Kinds of reading matter call for different kinds of reading.

Adler suggests that the due to their magnitude and seminal power, the books included in the book sets "will not yield their treasures to us without our digging" and that they "will not give something to us unless we give something to them". What is required of the reader who wishes to be wakeful and active in the process of reading is simply the asking of questions:

1. What is this piece of writing about? What is the leading theme or the main point? What is it trying to say?
2. How does it say what it is trying to say? How does the writer get his central point across? How does he tell his story or argue for his conclusion to produce the effect in us that he is aiming at?
3. Is it true - factually or poetically - in whole or part? Has he won our assent or sympathy? And if not, what reasons do we have for disagreeing with or rejecting his view of things?
4. What of it? What meaning does it have for us in the shape of opinions or attitudes that we are led to form for ourselves as the result of reading this piece?

The Gateway to the Great Books and GBWW have books that are bound with 4 different colors to denote the type of material they are:

1. Yellow: works of the imagination - epic and dramatic poetry and, novels, and essays
2. Blue: biographies and histories, treatises in politics, economics, and jurisprudence
3. Green: major contributions to the fields of mathematics and science
4. Red: works of philosophy and theology

These four different kinds of writing not only cover different subjects, but "represent four different kinds of thinking ... and different aspects of human nature". These different kinds of works have to be read differently. 

Expository Works:

• A work of art has unity; whatever it is can be stated simply as a summary of what the whole work or piece of writing is about. The reader should know what the major parts of the work are and how they are ordered to one another and to the whole. 
• The reader should try to summary the problems which the author set before himself and tried to solve. 
• The reader should try to come to terms with the author. Discover the basic terms which express the author's central notions or ideas. This can be done by noting the words carefully and discovering the five or ten which constitute his special vocabulary.
• A term is a word used unambiguously. It is a word which does not change within the context of a particular piece of writing.
• Figure out the author's propositions: what he is affirming or denying, what the bedrock assumptions are. 
• Find the key sentences (propositions) and paragraphs (arguments) that express the writer's basic arguments in support of the opinion that he wishes to persuade us to accept.
• Rephrase the argument and give real world examples. 

Approaches to reading: analytical (dissect the whole into parts and relate the pats), interpretive (what does the author mean), and critical. 

Maxims of Critical Reading:

• Never agree or disagree with the author until you understand what is being said. 
  
• There is no point in winning an argument if we know or suspect that we are wrong
• Don't undertake argument unless you are equally ready to agree and disagree. 
• Reasons for disagreement:
• Author is uninformed on a central point that is relevant to his conclusions
• Author is uninformed about some consideration that would alter the course of his argument
• because we believe that he is committed some fallacy
• because we think his analysis is incomplete

Imaginative Works:

• The analogies for terms, propositions, and arguments for imaginative writing are the vast of characters, their actions passions, their thought and speech, the sequence of events, and the plot together with the subplot. 
• As factual truth and logical consistency are important to expository writing, a narrative's verisimilitude or credibility (its poetic truth) and its unity, clarity, and coherence (its artistic beauty) are important objects of criticism in the case of fiction.  `
• Differences between expository and imaginative works:
• A story must be apprehended as a whole, whereas an expository work can be read in parts.
• A story requires the reading of nothing outside of itself.
• The unity of a narrative lies in its plot. 
• The use of language in a work of literature is often used to conceal rather than to make clear.
• The truth of a work of fiction depends upon an internal necessity and probability. Characters and action must fit together to make the narrative a likely story. "However fanciful the story may be, it has the ring of truth if it is believable as we read it - if we can feel at home in the world that the imaginative writer has created for us". 

After giving some recommendations for reading different kinds of material, Adler gives some advice on annotating material and reading through the material once all the way through even if you don't understand it all. After this, Adler provides some short sections where he attempts to "acquaint the reader with the four types of subject matter which are represented in the Gateway.

1. The Imagination of Man
1. The Imagination is one of the highest prerogatives of man. By this faculty he unites former images and ideas ... and thus creates brilliant and novel results" - Darwin
2. Imagination evokes things which never existed; it grants us empathy.
3. Literature has the power to move us.
4. "Hence poetry is something more philosophic and of graver import than history, since its statements are of the nature rather of universals whereas those of history are singular" - Aristotle.
5. The unity and completeness of an imaginative work - plus the harmony of its construction - serve as criteria under the experienced examination of the critic., To these there may be added the usually paired criteria of universality and durability applicable to all works of the mind. 
6. Comedy can be humbling, sedative, or serve as societal criticism. 
7. Literature can depict the battles between man and society and man vs himself. It asks if man is good by nature?`
2. Man and Society
1. History is of communities of people, of society. What is history, can we trust it, and what does it teach us?
2. What is liberty?
3. How much power should people have in gov.? What are the rights of the minority~?
4. On America; is equality good per se?
5. Is war inevitable? What of world government?
3. Science and Mathematics
1. Why study outdated science?
2. What is the role of experiment? Is sense-perception all that is required of science?
3. Are science and mathematics true outside of man? Why pursue science?
4. Philosophy
1. Adler goes through the problems of philosophy. He discusses the differences between science, theology, and philosophy. 

Syntopicon

The Syntopicon organizes works by ideas. It allows the reader to ask "himself how the particular piece that he is reading is related to other pieces of writing". 

The Syntopical Guide answers this question for him, at least so far as two large sets of books are concerned, comprising in all more than six hundred works. The rules proposes earlier give the reader guidance on how to read a single work, whereas the Syntopical Guide shows him how to read not just one but two large collections of works.