Classics education at Seoul Nat`l Univ.

“A classic is something that everybody wants to have read and nobody wants to read,” said American author and humorist Mark Twain (1835–1910), who added his novel “The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn” to the list of classics. This is in line with the general public’s belief that a classic is boring and read by only someone special.

Seoul National University, Korea`s top institution of higher learning, will reinforce classics education, the essence of liberal arts, to its students from next year. A newly required class will make students read three classics per year and discuss them in small groups. The purpose of a university is to provide a holistic education based on liberal arts and classics. A liberal arts college is supposed to specialize in research and education of liberal arts. Yet Seoul National University`s plan for a class on reading classics shows something wrong with Korea’s college education. As many college students are busy looking for jobs, they do not read classics and have a less-than-expected humanities background.

The University of Chicago, which has produced the largest number of Nobel laureates, was initially not a prestigious university. The school made big progress when Robert Hutchins took over as president in the 1920s. He introduced his so-called Chicago Plan under which students could not graduate without reading 100 great classics. As a result, the university achieved fame by spawning 68 Nobel laureates between 1929 and 2000. At St. John’s College, a liberal arts school in Annapolis, Maryland, students read and discuss 100 classics only over four years.

Classics are the treasure chest of today`s cultural content and sources of imagination and creativity. As society has gotten more cutting-edge information and grown more complicated, classics, which provide a deep understanding of people and insights into history, rise in importance. Apple founder Steve Jobs added his humanities insights when he developed the iPhone. The framework of Hollywood movies largely depends on Greek and Roman myths. Modern ideologies since the Renaissance are based on Plato’s “The Republic.” Hopefully, the classic reading class at Seoul National University`s liberal arts college could spread to the school`s other colleges and even to other universities in creating a renaissance of classics.

Editorial Writer Chung Sung-hee (shchung@donga.com)