Halifax Humanities Society celebrates 20 years of sharing great books with community

The Halifax Humanities 101 class of 2025-2026 is pictured. (Source: Halifax Humanities Society)

The Odyssey tracks the 10-year journey of fabled hero Odysseus as he tries to return home after playing a key role in the Trojan War. Broken into 24 books, the tale is a lengthy one, full of dangerous travels, murderous monsters and lots of bad weather.

This month, 24 dedicated readers and performers plan to fit in all the mayhem and wonders of the classic story in one show, but be warned: you’ll need to a fair bit of time to see it all.

They’re planning to read the Odyssey across 24 hours.

“Every year we do a marathon reading fundraiser,” said Katie Carline, interim executive director of the Halifax Humanities Society. “We do different works every year. The Odyssey is a perennial favourite. It has the benefit of being quite long.

“We’ve also done Faust, Dante, Jane Austen, Alice in Wonderland.”

The annual reading session, which kicks off at 6 p.m. on April 10 at the New Academic Building at the University of King’s College, will raise money for the Halifax Humanities Society, which is celebrating 20 years of making discussions around classic literature more accessible.

“I was really drawn to their mission of providing humanities education for people who might otherwise lack it,” said Carline, who started volunteering with the society four years ago. “Our programs are open to anyone who has faced barriers to universities.

“One of the things I love about Halifax Humanities is the belief studying and learning together is something that builds us all up.”

According to the society’s website, they were originally inspired by writer and educator Earl Shorris, who created the free Clemente Course in the Humanities in the lower east side of Manhattan in 1995. Halifax-based advocates formed the Saint George’s Friends of Clemente Society in 2003, focusing on providing humanities education for people living in poverty.

The group launched Halifax Humanities 101 as an eight-month pilot project in October 2005. It later partnered with surrounding universities and has had more than 150 students.

“Halifax has changed as a city, so we now recruit students all across the city,” Carline said. “We’ve changed and developed our curriculum. We’ve evolved by including more diverse, global voices in our curriculum. We’re paying more attention to voices and ideas outside the traditional European sphere.”

Carline said one of her favourite parts of the program is watching participants discover how thoughts and writers from centuries ago can still resonate today.

“We read Dante’s Divine Comedy every year,” she said. “It’s a massive poem and something our students approach with some trepidation. One of the joys I’ve seen students experience with that text is realizing how the many levels of critique and analysis can be open to them.

“The point of reading a great work is to be able to critique the author and challenge the suppositions the author has and also appreciate the ideas a writer is putting forward. The value our students get from the community they’ve built is heartening to see.”

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