Previous Classes

The curriculum for Torrey Berkeley varies with every year. The first class read mainly Tolkien and Lewis, but they were not read at all in 2001 when the emphasis was on Chesterton and Bonhoeffer. Torrey Berkeley has a track record of experimenting with new curriculur ideas. This spirit of innovation is perhaps why some refer to the Torrey Berkeley program as the "Skunkworks of Torrey"

Below are brief descriptions of each class since 1999. These are immediately followed by a list of assigned reading.

An exploration of the role of creativity and imagination in the Christian life. This survey of 20th century fiction by Christian authors confronted students with the power of storytelling and discussed many of the concerns facing contemporary literature today.

C.S. Lewis

The Chronicles of Narnia
• The Magician's Nephew
• The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe
• The Horse and His Boy
• Prince Caspian
• The Voyage of the Dawn Treader
• The Silver Chair
• The Last Battle
   
  
The Space Trilogy
• Out of the Silent Planet
• Perelandra
• That Hideous Strength

J.R.R. Tolkien

• The Lord of the Rings

George MacDonald

• At the Back of the North Wind

This ambitious juxtaposition of Victorian novelists Trollope and Doyle with the neo-Victorian Lewis and the not-Victorian Vanauken presented students with different instantiations of English virtue. The logical faculty is at its best in Sherlock Holmes, but Vanauken needs more to make a decision.

Anthony Trollope

• The Warden
• Barchester Towers
• Dr. Thorne

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

• The Hound of Baskerville

C.S. Lewis

• Out of the Silent Planet
• Perelandra
• That Hideous Strength

Sheldon Vanauken

• A Severe Mercy

Two European juggernauts wrestle with the implications of Christianity. For Bonhoeffer, Christ seems to speak to him most clearly through the experience of everyday life. Whether it was through a person, an illness, or the political world, Bonhoeffer interacted with God in the details. Chesterton, on the other hand, seemed to have thought in blocks of centuries and years, not minutes. In both cases these novels, biographies, and reflections announce the power of ideas lived out across many different circumstances.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer

• Psalms: Prayerbook of the Bible
• Life Together
• Christ the Center
• Cost of Discipleship
• Letters & Papers from Prison

G.K. Chesterton

• Orthodoxy
• St. Francis of Assisi
• St. Thomas Aquinas
• Everlasting Man
• Man Who Was Thursday
• Manalive

This exciting curriculum had one of the most ambitious booklists of any Torrey Berkeley to date. If not for the depth of pages, the breadth of authors and originality of concepts made this blitzkrieg of imaginative literature a challenging survey. Students grappled with more creativity than they could handle and then picked up the pieces in classroom discussions.

Austin Farrer

• The Glass of Vision

William Shakespeare

• Midsummer Nights Dream

G.K. Chesterton

• The Man Who Was Thursday

Dorothy Sayers

• Gaudy Night

George McDonald

• Thomas Wingfold, Curate

Charles Williams

• Many Dimensions

C.S. Lewis

• Till We Have Faces

J.R.R. Tolkien

• Lord of the Rings

Building off of the the creative and innovative foundation from last year, this class added contemporary author Annie Dillary and the New Testament book of Colossians to the mix. Every summer a Biblical text is incorporated into the curriculum, but this year a special attempt was made to see the cosmic perspective of scripture as a source of light for the creative/redemptive mind.

Annie Dillard

• Pilgrim at Tinker Creek

G.K. Chesterton

• The Man Who Was Thursday

George MacDonald

• At the Back of the North Wind

Jane Austen

• Emma

J.R.R. Tolkien

• The Silmarilion

Frederick Buechner

• The Alphabet of Grace

William Shakespeare

• Julius Caesar

Flannery O'Connor

• Wise Blood

C.S. Lewis

• The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe
• The Magician's Nephew

A special focus on biographies and the examples of Christians throughout the ages provided a backdrop for this conceptually-drive class. Modern day saints were discussed in the context of ancient ones, and Ephesians was brought to bear on the the subject of the ultimate Christian life.

Athanasius of Alexandria

• Life of Antony

G.K. Chesterton

• Saint Thomas Aquinas: The Dumb Ox
• Saint Francis of Assisi

Philip E. Johnson

• The Right Questions

C.S. Lewis

• Surprised by Joy

John Foxe

• Book of Martyrs

Sheldon Vanauken

• A Severe Mercy

Elizabeth Eliot

• Through Gates of Splendor

William Shakespeare

• A Comedy of Errors

John Sargent

• Life & Letters of Henry Martyn

Revelation's description of the cosmic reality of Christ and the way that it interacts with and informs the Christian life is set against a series of books which deal with eschatology is very different ways. MacDonald presents child death, Chesterton presents deadly ideas, Lewis examines the end of all things from two different perspectives, and much more.

The Holy Bible

• The Apocalypse of John

Eugene Peterson

• Reversed Thunder

G.K. Chesterton

• The Man Who Was Thursday

C.S. Lewis

• The Great Divorce
• The Last Battle
• The Voyage of the Dawn Treader
   
  
The Space Trilogy
• Out of the Silent Planet
• Perelandra
• That Hideous Strength

William Shakespeare

• Othello

George MacDonald

• At the Back of the North Wind

Another innovative curriculum, this class featured Californian authors and dealt with the formation of the literary and cultural soul of California. Classroom discussions centered on the personalities of many of the fictional characters and discussed them in light of Philippians.

Robinson Jeffers

• Selected Poems

John Muir

• Essays

Jack London

• Martin Eden

Lawrence Ferlinghetti

• These are my Rivers

William Shakespeare

• The Merry Wives of Windsor

John Steinbeck

• East of Eden

Ambrose Bierce

• The Unabridged Devil's Dictionary

Czeslaw Milosz

• Visions from San Francisco Bay