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| Donald Kagan (Yale Daily News photo) |
Kagan, who came to Yale in 1969, was a distinguished scholar of Ancient Greek history. His monumental four-volume history of the Peloponnesian War (1969–1987) was characterized by George Steiner as “the foremost work of history produced in North America in the 20th century”....In 1970, without knowing what I was getting into—-how much can one find out from a brochure?—I signed up for Directed Studies, an integrated liberal arts program that immersed freshmen in the Western canon. First year Literature, Art, Philosophy, and European History courses all began with the pre-Socratic Greeks and ended before World War I.
From his first years at Yale, Kagan was heralded as a dynamic and influential teacher, a galvanizing presence whose lectures on Ancient Greek history, delivered with eloquence, dry wit, and deadpan humor, filled classrooms to overflowing, despite his strict grading policies. The Socratic dialogue of his seminars made entry into one of them a winning lottery ticket for aspirants.
Having joined the faculty the previous year, Donald Kagan already was one of the rock stars of Directed Studies, and his 90-minute lectures were organized, incisive, and chock full of information. (By the way, he had a slight speech impediment that I only mention because he was the first really smart person that I knew who had one.)
Though I eventually majored in Finance in graduate school and received a CPA, 1970-71 was the most intense and interesting educational year I ever had, and Professor Kagan had a lot to do with it.
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