Summary
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss Humanism. On the 3rd January 106 BC Marcus Tullius Cicero, lawyer, politician, Roman philosopher and the founding father of Humanism was born. His academy, the Studia Humanitas taught ‘the art of living well and blessedly through learning and instruction in the fine arts’, his version of ‘humanitas’ put man not God at the centre of the world.Centuries later, Cicero’s teachings had been metamorphosed into ‘Classical Humanism’, a faith in the soft arts of the Greek world. But how did Cicero’s ideas become Renaissance ideals? How did a small Greek curriculum later become a world philosophy? The human centred creed is credited with giving us human rights and democracy but has also been blamed for the most unspeakable horrors of the modern age. Have his ideas been distorted through the centuries for political ends? And why do some contemporary thinkers think the Humanist tradition is responsible for Elitism, Sexism and even Nazism? With Tony Davies, Professor and Head of the Department of English, University of Birmingham and author of Humanism; Lisa Jardine, Professor of Renaissance Studies, Queen Mary College, University of London and Honorary Fellow of Kings College Cambridge; Simon Goldhill, Reader in Greek Literature and Culture at Kings College Cambridge.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Thanks for downloading the Inartime podcast. For more details about Inartime and for our terms of use |
| 0:05.4 | Please go to bbc.co.uk forward slash radio for I hope you enjoy the program |
| 0:11.8 | Hello Marcus Tullyis Cicero was born in 106 BC |
| 0:15.4 | He was a lawyer a politician a Roman philosopher and the founding father of humanism his academy the studio Humanitas taught the art of living |
| 0:23.8 | Well and blessedly through learning and instruction in the fine arts |
| 0:28.0 | centuries later Cicero's teaching had been metamorphosed into a classical humanism a faith in what could be called the soft arts of the Greek world |
| 0:35.9 | But how did Cicero's ideas become or a nest on side deals and how did a small Greek curriculum later become a world philosophy |
| 0:43.5 | And why does some contemporary thinkers think that the humanist tradition is responsible for elitism sexism and even Nazism |
| 0:50.5 | When me to discuss humanism as a professor of literature an intellectual historian and a classicist |
| 0:55.7 | Tony Davis is head of the Department of English at the University of Birmingham |
| 0:59.2 | He's a jardin his professor of our nest on studies at Queen Mary University London |
| 1:03.6 | And the classicist Simon Goldhill is reader in Greek literature and culture at King's College Cambridge Tony Davis |
| 1:09.2 | Cicero's academy of the studio Humanitas called out for a complete system of education focusing heavily on personal development |
| 1:16.8 | Now what were the Roman values that Cicero was reacting against? |
| 1:20.6 | Two things I think one can say he was reacting against one was a tradition of Roman |
| 1:25.6 | Philistinism and pragmatism |
| 1:28.8 | And although Cicero's adaptation of Greek ideas |
| 1:32.7 | Is in part a translation of them into a more pragmatic and Roman register than they had in their Greek originals |
| 1:38.8 | So that's the first thing |
| 1:40.3 | And the second thing you know he's reacting against is what he regarded as superstitious tradition of popular religion |
| 1:46.4 | And an Olympian |
| 1:49.6 | Deities worshipped in small shrines and local cults that kind of thing |
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