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Book List

 

Though subject to minor changes year-to-year, the following texts are typical for a standard Center year. (Additional texts of interest to individual students can be added and studied during one-on-one tutorial time.) The Center also informs all incoming students on what specific editions and versions to buy so that every one is (literally) on the same page.

 

Center for Western Studies

Book List for 2026-27

Below you will find the books and the editions we will be using for the year, starting in September.  Often our students already own some of these books, but please make note of the editions/translations, not just the titles, as we will want to “be on the same page” for our lectures/discussions.

BOOK LIST FOR CWS - Fall 2026 - Spring 2027

Fall Semester

C S Lewis, Abolition of Man

Homer, Odyssey - Fagles translation.

Aeschylus, Orestia Trilogy

Aristotle Ethics

Augustine Confessions

Boethius Consolation of Philosophy

Bonaventure Journey of the Mind to God

Dante Inferno, Esolen Translation

Spring Semester

Shakespeare (any editions)

King Lear

Hamlet

A Midsummer Night’s Dream

Spenser Fairy Queene (Book 1)

Erasmus In Praise of Folly

Rousseau Social Contract

Shelley - Frankenstein

Marx Communist Manifesto

Bastiat The Law

Richard Weaver, Ideas Have Consequences

Conrad Heart of Darkness

O’Connor Short Stories

Chesterton Orthodoxy

T S Eliot Wasteland

T S Eliot Four Quartets

Lewis Four Loves

Fleming Arts and Ideas, 9th edition