Classical Theory

A Tai Chi instructor for over 40 years, Dr. Frank Bisceglia, EdD, explains how to incorporate the mysterious Metaphysical elixir of Yin and Yang into your practice and daily existence.Along with addressing many of the fundamental physical techniques, Dr. Bisceglia reveals how to transform Tai Chi into a unique, fulfilling and worthwhile exercise by incorporating the theories that unite the practical and spiritual elements of this ancient Art. His insightful commentary and inspirational view provide a path for illuminating one’s connection to the universe and the marvel of its’ impact on...

What makes a symphony a masterpiece? Why do certain symphonies continue to move audiences centuries after they were composed? The Anatomy of a Symphony takes you deep into the heart of the greatest orchestral works ever written, unlocking their structure, meaning, and emotional power. From Haydn’s groundbreaking classical forms to Beethoven’s revolutionary intensity, from the rich storytelling of Tchaikovsky to the daring innovations of modern symphonists, this book explores the evolution of the symphony and the genius behind its creation. With clear, engaging explanations, you’ll ...

Justice, Power, and Society: Exploring the Foundations of Moral and Political Theory is a clear and engaging guide to the ideas that have shaped human thought for centuries. From Plato’s vision of the just republic to Aristotle’s ethics of civic virtue, from social contract theory to Enlightenment ideals of liberty and rights, from utilitarianism to Marxist critiques of inequality, this book explores how great thinkers have answered the timeless questions: What is justice? Why should we obey laws? How can power be made legitimate? Moving beyond the classics, this book also examines the ...

The Prison Notebooks were a series of essays written by the Italian neo-Marxist Antonio Gramsci. Gramsci was imprisoned by the Italian Fascist regime in 1926, and the notebooks were written between 1929 and 1935, when Gramsci was released from prison on grounds of ill-health. He died in April...

The forerunner to The Lord of the Rings, The Silmarillion tells the earlier history of Middle-earth, recounting the events of the First and Second Ages, and introducing some of the key characters, such as Galadriel, Elrond, Elendil and the Dark Lord, Sauron. The tales of The Silmarillion are set...

In clear and entertaining prose, Plotkin explores a thousand years of music, introduces listeners to more than 100 great works, and profiles in depth many significant composers, including Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, Berlioz, Tchaikovsky, Dvoxak, and Mahler. He describes all the musical instruments in the orchestra, defines major musical terms, and makes music theory comprehensible for the uninitiated. There are also conversations with important musicians who offer fascinating insights about their art.

UNABRIDGED AND AVAILABLE ON AUDIO FOR THE FIRST TIME Simone de Beauvoir’s essential masterwork is a powerful analysis of the Western notion of “woman,” and a revolutionary exploration of inequality and otherness. This unabridged edition of the text reinstates significant portions of the...

Christmas 1951, Los Angeles: a city where the police are as corrupt as the criminals. Six prisoners are beaten senseless in their cells by cops crazed on alcohol. For the three L. A. P. D. detectives involved, it will expose the guilty secrets on which they have built their corrupt and violent...

A Landmark Translation of the Original Renaissance Quadrivium Athanasius Kircher (1602–1680) was the last great Renaissance polymath—and one of the first global scholars. In the mid-1600s, he published his monumental three-volume work, Oedipus Aegyptiacus, which aimed to decode the ancient world’s symbolic language. This volume contains Kircher’s exploration of the Quadrivium: Arithmetic, Geometry, Music, and Astronomy—the four liberal arts of classical education. Drawing on ancient sources from Pythagoras to Plato, Kircher weaves a cosmological vision in which number, form, sound...

Listeners to The Dialogue of St. Catherine of Siena will find her revelations from God as informative - and formative - as those who recognized her sanctity during her life. The universally applicable yet intimately personal messages she received from God are as much for us as they were for Catherine. We can listen to God's communications to his beloved daughter with detached awe or we can receive His messages to us through her writings.

Capitalism has blessed the world with wealth and technological miracles. It has also cursed it with urban slums, powerless workers, and the vicious boom-and-bust economy. If only there were some way to fix the problems of capitalism and keep all its benefits. In 1897, Henry George published his solution to this puzzle, Progress and Poverty. He suggested that, unlike all other taxes, a tax on land doesn't discourage entrepreneurship. A single tax on land can raise the revenues we need to help the poor without destroying the incentive to create wealth.

PLATO'S THE REPUBLIC The West's Foundational Quest for Justice What is Justice? And why is a just life better than an unjust one? For twenty-four centuries, this single, electrifying question has driven one of the most important books ever written. Plato’s The Republic is the defining work of Western philosophy, exploring everything from the structure of the perfect society to the nature of the soul. It begins as a fierce debate led by Socrates—an intense argument against the Sophist Thrasymachus who boldly claims: “Justice is nothing other than the advantage of the stronger.” To ...

Discourses on Livy, written in 1531, is as essential to understanding Machiavelli as his famous treatise, The Prince. Equally controversial, it reveals his fundamental preference for a republican state. Comparing the practice of the ancient Romans with that of his contemporaries provided Machiavelli with a consistent point of view in all his works. Machiavelli's close analysis of Livy's history of Rome led him to advance his most original and outspoken view of politics--the belief that a healthy political body was characterized by social friction and conflict rather than by rigid stability.

In 1947, British scholar, playwright, and novelist Dorothy Sayers stood in an Oxford hall and delivered a speech that would become a catalyst of the current classical education movement. The Lost Tools of Learning is a flagship address presenting the tools that were given to students in the Middle Ages via the trivium, the study of grammar, logic, and rhetoric. For perhaps the first time, these trivium subjects were applied by Sayers to students' developmental stages. She also advocates the integration of subjects.

A four-thousand-year history of music that reveals how songs have shifted societies and sparked revolutions. “A dauntingly ambitious, obsessively researched labor of cultural provocation.” ―Los Angeles Times Histories of music overwhelmingly suppress stories of the outsiders and rebels who...

An electrifying new study that investigates the challenges of the Bard’s inconsistencies and flaws, and focuses on revealing—not resolving—the ambiguities of the plays and their changing topicality A genius and prophet whose timeless works encapsulate the human condition like no other. A...

120 Famous Easy Piano Songs for Beginners is more than a songbook, it's a step-by-step piano course with lessons and music theory, based on famous tunes and simplified classical pieces. It's perfect for ages 11 and up, and for adults of any age, even without prior musical experience.

Written in the 4th century BC as a series of lectures at the original Lyceum, this text is not a dry collection of laws. It is a rigorous, unsparing analysis of power. Aristotle asks the questions that still haunt us today: What is a citizen? Why do revolutions happen? Is democracy the best form of government, or a dangerous mob rule? How do we stop a tyrant? He argues that the state does not exist merely to provide security or economic growth, but for the sake of the "good life"—to allow human beings to flourish. From his defense of the middle class as the stabilizer of society to his ...

Martin Luther's Bondage of the Will (1525) is a response to Desiderius Erasmus's "Diatribe on Free Will.’ The work is considered as one of the great masterpieces of the Reformation. Luther writes powerfully about man's depravity and God's sovereignty in his direct style, which combines spirituality and humor. For Luther, the crucial issue was the ability of free will, and the extent to which it is subject to God's sovereignty.

Widely recognized as one of the most influential economists of the 20th century, Vilfredo Pareto helped to develop Microeconomics and established a number of theorems that bear his name. He is perhaps best known for the Pareto Principle or the 80/20 Principle, Pareto Index, and Pareto Efficiency. Following Léon Walras as Chair of Political Economy at the University of Lausanne, Pareto was one of the first to incorporate sociology and mathematics into the study of economics, thus bringing rigor to the discipline and solidifying it as a science.