After Troy: The Odyssey - Brook Farm Institute for Critical Studies The Odyssey is among the oldest works of literature in the Western tradition. Composed during the Archaic period of ancient Greece, it tells the fantastic stories of the hero Odysseus on his decade-long journey home across the Mediterranean after the fall of Troy, which include his adventures with the gods, man-eating giants and beguiling witches, … <p class="link-more"><a href="https://brookfarminstitute.com/seminars/the-odyssey/" class="more-link">Continue reading<span class="screen-reader-text"> "After Troy: The Odyssey"</span></a></p>

“The Odyssey helps me think about home, less as a particular place than as a state of mind. What is it to be an insider, or an outsider? Is it about where you are or where you come from, how you behave or the stories you tell?”— Emily Wilson Starts on May 10: brookfarminstitute.com/seminars/the...

Death, Desire, and the City: Baudelaire's Flowers of Evil - Brook Farm Institute for Critical Studies Often described as the quintessential poetry collection of modernity, Les Fleurs du Mal (The Flowers of Evil) remains an intriguing, even shocking record of the new subjective experience of life in the modern metropolis, a world of fractured beliefs and unstable grand narratives. Baudelaire’s poetic persona descends into the streets and looks head-on into the … <p class="link-more"><a href="https://brookfarminstitute.com/seminars/baudelaire-writer-of-modern-life/" class="more-link">Continue reading<span class="screen-reader-text"> "Death, Desire, and the City: Baudelaire’s Flowers of Evil"</span></a></p>

“The special beauty of so many of the openings of Baudelaire’s poems lies in this: a rising up from the abyss.” —Walter Benjamin. Check out our upcoming class on Baudelaire’s Les Fleurs du Mal, his writings on intoxication and art criticism, and more: brookfarminstitute.com/seminars/bau...

Beginning May 6 brookfarminstitute.com/seminars/pla...

Death, Desire, and the City: Baudelaire's Flowers of Evil - Brook Farm Institute for Critical Studies Often described as the quintessential poetry collection of modernity, Les Fleurs du Mal (The Flowers of Evil) remains an intriguing, even shocking record of the new subjective experience of life in th...

"Death, Desire, and the City: Baudelaire’s Flowers of Evil" · May 7 – May 28, 2026 · In person · Cambridge Community Center | Brook Farm Institute for Critical Studies brookfarminstitute.com/seminars/bau...

Plato's Republic: Justice and the Good Life - Brook Farm Institute for Critical Studies “Unless the philosophers rule as kings or those now called kings and chiefs genuinely and adequately philosophize, … there is no rest from ills for the cities, my dear Glaucon, nor I think for human k...

"Plato’s Republic: Justice and the Good Life" · May 6 – May 27, 2026 · In person · Cambridge Community Center | Brook Farm Institute for Critical Studies brookfarminstitute.com/seminars/pla...