The Late Middle Ages

by Philip Daileader

[Amber (The Literary Phoenix)]

I’m a sucker for The Great Courses because when they’re good, they’re really good. I absolutely loved the courses on Ancient Egypt and Myths in Human History, and I felt like I learned so much from those professors. On the other hand, I found the course on The Vikings disappointingly dull. This… sort of reflects my experience as a history major – some things are fascinating, others are a bit tedious, and it all depends on the professor. Therefore, my experience with The Great Courses has been hit-or-miss.

Unfortunately, I find that The Late Middle Ages was closer to a “miss” for me. While I enjoyed the subject and some individual lectures were fascinating, the course as a whole wasn’t presented in such a light that really gripped my attention. The Late Middle Ages (also known as the Last Medieval Era) spanned the course of 1250 CE to 1500 CE. There’s about 250 years of history in this chunk, including several key historic events that even non-history buffs will be familiar with, such as: the Spanish Inquisition, the Age of Exploration, and the Fall of Constantinople. There’s a lot of really interesting content in this lecture, so it was not that subject matter that threw me off… it was the lecturer.

Like all the professors I’ve encountered (both in these courses and in my own college experience), Philip Daileader knows his subject inside and out and is a master in his field. His knowledge and explanations here were great – he lost me with his lecturing style. It always felt to me like Professor Daileader was racing toward the end of his lectures. The way he spoke made me feel like he was simply exhausted in repeating this information. And, you know, I bet he is! Professors, experts in particular, get to repeat their lectures again and again and again forever and I’m sure that gets a bit boring. I would hear him sigh as he was lecturing, and any jokes he tried to make fell flat. As a lecturer, he didn’t grip me. This differs so much from Bob Brier, the Egyptian lecturer, who sounded excited to share his knowledge and included relevant activities in his lectures.

When I sat down and really listened, these lectures were packed with information. I actually took notes on the witch trial section, because I’m using the witch trial format in my current WIP, and I felt so informed after listening to that lecture. The Late Middle Ages was interesting and detailed… it’s the type of college class you find interesting, but don’t particularly like going to. From an information and historical quality perspective, I feel comfortable recommending this lecture. However, it’s a bit boring, so you have to be really interested in the subject matter.

And I majored in history with a medieval concentration… so I am super interested. But I really needed to zone in and focus to extract the information, because Professor Daileader was not doing anything special to pull me in.