The Clifton Waller Barrett Professor of English and Comparative Literature at the University of Virginia, Paul Cantor is a leading scholar of Shakespeare as well as an authority on American popular culture. In part one of a two part series, Cantor discusses comedies, tragedies, and what Shakespeare can teach us about politics. Plays discussed including Hamlet, Measure for Measure, The Merchant of Venice, Coriolanus, and Julius Caesar, among others. Visit www.thegreatthinkers.org for an online course on Shakespeare curated by Professor Cantor.

Charles Murray is one of America's most distinguished political scientists and the W. H. Brady Scholar at the American Enterprise Institute. This conversation focuses on Murray's groundbreaking books from "Losing Ground" to "Coming Apart," the controversies surrounding the publication of "The Bell Curve," as well as the economic and moral challenges that America faces today.

A fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, Elliott Abrams discusses his career in Washington, mostly in the State Department and the White House. Much of the conversation focuses on Abrams work on Latin American affairs and, particularly, Israel and Middle Eastern affairs.

Leon Kass and Amy Kass were for many years teachers at the University of Chicago. There, they taught great books, political philosophy, the Hebrew bible, literature, and many other subjects as part of the university's then-commitment to a comprehensive education. This conversation focuses on the experience of teaching as well as considers themes such as love, friendship, and courtship in contemporary America.

The first in a series of conversations with the Harvard government professor Harvey Mansfield. In this conversation Mansfield discusses his work on Edmund Burke, Alexis de Tocqueville, Niccolo Machiavelli, and the importance of political philosophy. He also discusses the influence of Leo Strauss.