The Civic Conversations of Thucydides and Plato
The Civic Conversations of Thucydides and Plato

Author: Gerald M. Mara

Publisher: State University of New York Press

Published: 2008-07-15

Total Pages: 340

ISBN-13: 0791477991

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This book argues that classical political philosophy, represented in the works of Thucydides and Plato, is an important resource for both contemporary democratic political theory and democratic citizens. By placing the Platonic dialogues and Thucydides' History in conversation with four significant forms of modern democratic theory—the rational choice perspective, deliberative democratic theory, the interpretation of democratic culture, and postmodernism—Gerald M. Mara contends that these classical authors are not enemies of democracy. Rather than arguing for the creation of a more encompassing theoretical framework guided by classical concerns, Mara offers readings that emphasize the need to focus critically on the purposes of politics, and therefore of democracy, as controversial yet unavoidable questions for political theory.

The Tragedy of the Athenian Ideal in Thucydides and Plato
The Tragedy of the Athenian Ideal in Thucydides and Plato

Author: John T. Hogan

Publisher: Lexington Books

Published: 2021-09-15

Total Pages: 374

ISBN-13: 9781498596329

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This book shows how Plato's Statesman and Thucydides' presentation of the moral collapse in Athenian political discourse reveal many points of agreement between Plato and Thucydides.

The Oxford Handbook of Thucydides
The Oxford Handbook of Thucydides

Author: Ryan Balot

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2017-02-10

Total Pages: 801

ISBN-13: 0190647744

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The Oxford Handbook of Thucydides contains newly commissioned essays on Thucydides as an historian, thinker, and writer. It also features chapters on Thucydides' intellectual context and ancient reception. The creative juxtaposition of historical, literary, philosophical, and reception studies allows for a better grasp of Thucydides' complex project and its intellectual context, while at the same time providing a comprehensive introduction to the author's ideas. The volume is organized into four sections of papers: History, Historiography, Political Theory, and Context and Reception. It therefore bridges traditionally divided disciplines. The authors engaged to write the forty chapters for this volume include both well-known scholars and less well-known innovators, who bring fresh ideas and new points of view. Articles avoid technical jargon and long footnotes, and are written in an accessible style. Finally, the volume includes a thorough introduction prefacing each paper, as well as several maps and an up-to-date bibliography that will enable further study. The Oxford Handbook of Thucydides offers a comprehensive introduction to a thinker and writer whose simultaneous depth and innovativeness have been the focus of intense literary and philosophical study since ancient times.

Thucydides and the Pursuit of Freedom
Thucydides and the Pursuit of Freedom

Author: Mary P. Nichols

Publisher: Cornell University Press

Published: 2015-03-05

Total Pages: 207

ISBN-13: 0801455588

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In this book, Mary P. Nichols argues for the centrality of the idea of freedom in Thucydides' thought.

The Cambridge Companion to Ancient Greek Political Thought
The Cambridge Companion to Ancient Greek Political Thought

Author: Stephen Salkever

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2009-04-27

Total Pages: 391

ISBN-13: 1139828029

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The Cambridge Companion to Ancient Greek Political Thought provides a guide to understanding the central texts and problems in ancient Greek political thought, from Homer through the Stoics and Epicureans. Composed of essays specially commissioned for this volume and written by leading scholars of classics, political science, and philosophy, the Companion brings these texts to life by analysing what they have to tell us about the problems of political life. Focusing on texts by Homer, Herodotus, Thucydides, Plato, and Aristotle, among others, they examine perennial issues, including rights and virtues, democracy and the rule of law, community formation and maintenance, and the ways in which theorizing of several genres can and cannot assist political practice.

A Handbook to the Reception of Thucydides
A Handbook to the Reception of Thucydides

Author: Christine Lee

Publisher: John Wiley & Sons

Published: 2015-01-20

Total Pages: 608

ISBN-13: 1405196912

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A Handbook to the Reception of Thucydides offers an invaluable guide to the reception of Thucydides, with a strong emphasis on comparing and contrasting different traditions of reading and interpretation. • Presents an in-depth, comprehensive overview of the reception of the Greek historian Thucydides • Features personal reflections by eminent scholars on the significance and perennial importance of Thucydides’ work • Features an internationally renowned cast of contributors, including established academics as well as new voices in the field

Libraries and the Global Retreat of Democracy
Libraries and the Global Retreat of Democracy

Author: Natalie Greene Taylor

Publisher: Emerald Group Publishing

Published: 2021-11-04

Total Pages: 302

ISBN-13: 1839825987

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Libraries and the Global Retreat of Democracy focuses on how libraries coordinate their work in political and information literacy and how these efforts can be improved, the recommendations and examples within which will serve as inspiration and motivation to its readers.

Plato's Political Thought
Plato's Political Thought

Author: John Lombardini

Publisher: BRILL

Published: 2023-12-18

Total Pages: 128

ISBN-13: 9004692223

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Plato’s political thought continues to be of enduring interest among classicists, philosophers, political theorists, and intellectual historians. The present volume introduces readers to the topic through a survey of important recent trends in the scholarly literature, focusing on challenges to the authenticity of the Seventh Letter; reassessments of the “Socratic Problem”; democratic readings of the Republic; and the rehabilitation of the Statesman and Laws. It provides an overview of the key methodological issues that must be addressed in interpreting the Platonic dialogues, while also suggesting directions for further research.

Ascent to the Good
Ascent to the Good

Author: William H. F. Altman

Publisher: Lexington Books

Published: 2018-11-29

Total Pages: 661

ISBN-13: 1498574629

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At the crisis of his Republic, Plato asks us to imagine what could possibly motivate a philosopher to return to the Cave voluntarily for the benefit of others and at the expense of her own personal happiness. This book shows how Plato has prepared us, his students, to recognize that the sun-like Idea of the Good is an infinitely greater object of serious philosophical concern than what is merely good for me, and thus why neither Plato nor his Socrates are eudaemonists, as Aristotle unquestionably was. With the transcendent Idea of Beauty having been made manifest through Socrates and Diotima, the dialogues between Symposium and Republic—Lysis, Euthydemus, Laches, Charmides, Gorgias, Theages, Meno, and Cleitophon— prepare the reader to make the final leap into Platonism, a soul-stirring idealism that presupposes the student’s inborn awareness that there is nothing just, noble, or beautiful about maximizing one’s own good. While perfectly capable of making the majority of his readers believe that he endorses the harmless claim that it is advantageous to be just and thus that we will always fare well by doing well, Plato trains his best students to recognize the deliberate fallacies and shortcuts that underwrite these claims, and thus to look beyond their own happiness by the time they reach the Allegory of the Cave, the culmination of a carefully prepared Ascent to the Good.

Recovering Reputation
Recovering Reputation

Author: Andreas Avgousti

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2022-06-03

Total Pages: 265

ISBN-13: 0197624081

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Andreas Avgousti considers the modern problem of reputation by turning to the dialogues of Plato, to show that reputation is not only an issue for political elites, but that it is a quality that helps the wider citizenry to cohere, bringing together citizens and non-citizens. Avgousti argues that reputation is worth thinking about because it is a power that circulates among the many, linked to and sustained by myths and rumors, and it is a power that the many exercise through the social mechanisms of praise and blame.