Our course theme, balancing duty and desire, is timeless and applies to people across cultures. Our overriding focal points will be on the delineation of communal and individual experiences (duty/desire) and the representation (mimesis) of the ways of life that affirm the dignity of the human spirit. By surveying various genres that developed in the ancient world, we will trace the varied life lessons that preoccupied the organizers of civilizations: attaining and bestowing honor, recognition of deities, handling extreme emotions and ambitions, and the meaning of life and death within each culture.