Classes with Kevin

  Students will learn the fundamentals of spoken communication and debate in this two semester course.  The  focus will be threefold: study, theory and application. The “Study” component will focus on the greatest speeches and debates in history, from the “Apology” of Socrates to “I Have a Dream” and beyond.  These famous speeches and debates will be analyzed from the perspective of argumentation, structure and rhetorical devices, forming the theoretical basis for in-class application. The “Application” of what we learn will consist of several speeches and debates that will be conducted live in class.  Students will present individual speeches and will engage in two-person debates.  Students will be coached in how to avoid common errors, such as saying “like” as a filler word, how to speak extemporaneously when called upon (particularly in an oral exam) and how to be effective and engaging when addressing an audience. Techniques of research, especially how ...

  Dystopias are “negative utopias”, man-made hells that seem to come from an attempt to build man-made heavens on earth.  They can be studied in both history and literature, which is what this course will set out to do. From a literary perspective, students will read famous dystopian novels and poems such as 1984, Brave New World, The Giver, “The Waste Land”, “The Second Coming” and more. From a historical perspective, students will examine the concept of hell in ancient and medieval times and will examine “failed utopias” in history, from the ancient Montanists through the early modern Anabaptists, up to the Communist totalitarian states of the USSR and China. The course will attempt to find a theoretical basis for understanding the dystopian strain in literature and history - and will identify active elements of “dystopianism” today. FALL 2024 - 13 Sessions - Wednesdays at 2:00 pm Eastern from Sept. 11 to Dec. 11, 2024, with no meeting on Wednesday, Nov. 27 for Thanksgiving ...

  Drama and dramatic literature are at the heart of the human experience.  This course will examine the history of Western Drama, reading plays from Ancient Greece, through Medieval, Renaissance and early Modern times to current Broadway hits.  Drama will be examined from several perspectives: its relation to religious festivals in the ancient and medieval world; its use as a “mirror” that is held up to human nature (in Hamlet’s words); its relation to the history and culture of its various eras; and its ongoing symbolic and ritualistic aspects, even in our current age.   Students will learn the elements of dramatic literature, including staging, plot, character development, catharsis, denouement, etc., and will get a taste of various theories of Drama, from Aristotle to Nietzsche. More than anything, students will be exposed to a survey of great dramatic literature, including Sophocles, Plautus, Shakespeare, Marlowe, Ibsen, Shaw, O’Neil, Miller and others....

What is allegory?  How is symbolism used in literature and myth?  How do writers use imagery to convey themes and moods in fiction and poetry?  How do symbols and allegories express the deepest strands of our psyches? These are some of the questions that will be examined in this course, which will introduce students to Allegory, Symbolism and Imagery through works such as “The Allegory of the Cave” from Plato’s Republic, Everyman, Pilgrim’s Progress, “The Masque of the Red Death”, Animal Farm, Tolkien’s story “Leaf by Niggle”, various poems and more.  In addition, the Symbolist movement in art and literature will be examined, as will Freud and Jung’s approach to the analysis of symbols and “archetypes” in myths and dreams. SPRING 2025: 15 Sessions - Wednesdays at 11:00 am Pacific; Noon Mountain; 1:00 pm Central; 2:00 pm Eastern from Jan. 15 to April 16, 2025, with no meeting on Wednesday, March 12 for Spring Break and Wednesday, April 23 for Easter Break. Age Range: ...

  I'm Kevin O'Brien! I am a creative and passionate online teacher. Here are a few things about me ... Professional Actor and Comedian Many years ago, I made a living as a stand-up comedian.  I also owned my own singing telegram company and performed over 2,000 singing telegrams in the St. Louis metro area. In 1991, I performed at military bases around the world with an Old Fashioned Comedy Melodrama that I wrote and produced, on a USO-style tour. Since 1989, I have been producing and performing in my own interactive murder mystery dinner theater shows.  I appear in about 150 live performances a year, at venues such as mansions, wineries and dinner trains.  I write all of the scripts and we perform a different script every month! Click on the photo below to visit my murder mystery website. To get a better idea of the kind of shows we do, check out the promo video I put together for George R. R. Martin, who hired us to perform murder mysteries on his train in New Mexi...