Rescuing Socrates

Rescuing Socrates is a warm, appealing narrative of how it feels to be 'thrust into a conversation' with fellow students about life's most 'serious and unsettling questions.' ---Martha Bayles, Wall Street Journal [A] combination memoir and call to arms. . . . Despite those who claim that these are merely works by dead, possibly irrelevant white men, Montas argues that the Great Books approach has a fundamentally democratizing impulse. ---John McWhorter, New York Times Thanks to Montas . . . Socrates had a good 2021. ---George F. Will, Washington Post That's why the perspective of Roosevelt Montas, author of Rescuing Socrates: How the Great Books Changed My Life and Why They Matter for a New Generation, is so badly needed. . . . In this part memoir, part call to action, Montas argues that reading great literature and philosophy can make working-class people's lives more meaningful and that everyone should have the opportunity to read great books. ---Liza Featherstone, Jacobin [An] insightful work. . . . Few colleges and universities still require study of Great Books as part of their curricula, but Monta s makes a compelling case for the life-changing results of such pedagogy; he notes how, as an e migre from the Dominican Republic, he benefited from the breadth and depth of these approaches. * Library Journal * By taking us through his reading and rereading of books over the course of a life, Montas can articulate what is rarely articulated well about great books education. ---Jonathan Marks, Washington Examiner A heartbreakingly honest immigrant tale of displacement, loss, wrenching readjustment and self-discovery, this book also offers a gripping account of how participation in the great conversation over justice, ethics, citizenship and the nature of the good life can subvert hierarchies of privilege, redeem lost souls, open minds and transform lives. ---Steve Mintz, Inside Higher Ed Rescuing Socrates, Roosevelt Montas's memoir-cum-paean to the classics, is a timely and much-needed book. . . . If administrators and education advocates take the message of Rescuing Socrates to heart, then our students, our schools, and our nation might yet see a brighter future. ---Matthew Levey, City Journal