Why Socrates Died: Dispelling the MythsW. W. Norton & Company, 8.6.2009 - 288 sivua A revisionist account of the most famous trial and execution in Western civilization—one with great resonance for American society today. Socrates’ trial and death together form an iconic moment in Western civilization. In 399 BCE, the great philosopher stood before an Athenian jury on serious charges: impiety and “subverting the young men of the city.” The picture we have of it—created by his immediate followers, Plato and Xenophon, and perpetuated in countless works of literature and art ever since—is of a noble man putting his lips to the poisonous cup of hemlock, sentenced to death in a fit of folly by an ancient Athenian democracy already fighting for its own life. But an icon, an image, is not reality, and time has transmuted so many of the facts into historical fable.Aware of these myths, Robin Waterfield has examined the actual Greek sources and presents here a new Socrates, in which he separates the legend from the man himself. As Waterfield recounts the story, the charges of impiety and corrupting the youth of Athens were already enough for a death sentence, but the prosecutors accused him of more. They asserted that Socrates was not just an atheist and the guru of a weird sect but also an elitist who surrounded himself with politically undesirable characters and had mentored those responsible for defeat in the Peloponnesian War. Their claims were not without substance, for Plato and Xenophon, among Socrates’ closest companions, had idolized him as students, while Alcibiades, the hawkish and notoriously self-serving general, had brought Athens to the brink of military disaster. In fact, as Waterfield perceptively shows through an engrossing historical narrative, there was a great deal of truth, from an Athenian perspective, in these charges. The trial was, in part, a response to troubled times—Athens was reeling from a catastrophic war and undergoing turbulent social changes—and Socrates’ companions were unfortunately direct representatives of these troubles. Their words and actions, judiciously sifted and placed in proper context, not only serve to portray Socrates as a flesh-and-blood historical figure but also provide a good lens through which to explore both the trial and the general history of the period. Ultimately, the study of these events and principal figures allows us to finally strip away the veneer that has for so long denied us glimpses of the real Socrates. Why Socrates Died is an illuminating, authoritative account of not only one of the defining periods of Western civilization but also of one of its most defining figures. |
Kirjan sisältä
Sivu xvii
... involved to name one by one , so I thank you all collectively . Collective thanks also go to the staff of the Library of the Institute of Classical Studies , London ; the British Library ; the Library of the British School at Athens ...
... involved to name one by one , so I thank you all collectively . Collective thanks also go to the staff of the Library of the Institute of Classical Studies , London ; the British Library ; the Library of the British School at Athens ...
Sivu 14
... the superficiality of their arguments . They were not educators in genuine morality , because they taught their students only the eristic art of winning arguments , whether or not that involved searching for 14 THE TRIAL OF SOCRATES.
... the superficiality of their arguments . They were not educators in genuine morality , because they taught their students only the eristic art of winning arguments , whether or not that involved searching for 14 THE TRIAL OF SOCRATES.
Sivu 15
Robin Waterfield. winning arguments , whether or not that involved searching for the truth . Only Socrates had at heart his students ' moral improvement . This shaky foundation is all that allows us to distinguish Socrates from those ...
Robin Waterfield. winning arguments , whether or not that involved searching for the truth . Only Socrates had at heart his students ' moral improvement . This shaky foundation is all that allows us to distinguish Socrates from those ...
Sivu 21
... involved in the matter at trial . The surviving oratorical corpus yields only four cases in which a pros- ecutor claims to act as a purely disinterested public actor . ' And so the prosecutor of a case would typically begin by claiming ...
... involved in the matter at trial . The surviving oratorical corpus yields only four cases in which a pros- ecutor claims to act as a purely disinterested public actor . ' And so the prosecutor of a case would typically begin by claiming ...
Sivu 24
... involved member- ship of a committee ; above all , there was the use of the lottery . Only the boards of generals and of financial officers were elected ( since they were taken to require special expertise ) , while everyone else was ...
... involved member- ship of a committee ; above all , there was the use of the lottery . Only the boards of generals and of financial officers were elected ( since they were taken to require special expertise ) , while everyone else was ...
Sisältö
3 | |
20 | |
The Charge of Impiety | 32 |
Alcibiades Socrates and | 51 |
Pestilence and War | 67 |
The Rise and Fall of Alcibiades | 85 |
The End of the War | 103 |
Critias and Civil War | 122 |
Symptoms of Change | 139 |
Reactions to Intellectuals | 155 |
Socratic Politics | 173 |
A Cock for Asclepius | 191 |
Glossary | 205 |
Bibliography | 227 |
Index | 247 |
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accused Aegean affair Agora Alcibiades alliance allies ancient Athenian ancient Greek Andocides Anytus aristocrats Aristophanes Aristotle Assembly Atheism Athenian democracy Athenian politics Athenian society Athens's became Cambridge University Press charge Charmides citizens claim Classical Athens clubs comic constitution court crimes Critias death defeat defence speeches democratic dialogue dikasts elite empire enemies Euripides exile fact favour festival fifth century friends gods Gorgias Greece herms hoplite hundred Hyperbolus impiety intellectuals involved Isocrates justice kind Lysander Meletus moral Mysteries Nicias oligarchic coup oligarchs one's ostracism Oxford University Press peace Peisander Peloponnesian Peloponnesian War Pericles Persian person philosopher Piraeus Plato Plato and Xenophon Plutarch poets politician Poteidaea Princeton prosecution prosecutors Protagoras Recollections of Socrates Religion religious repr Republic Rhetoric ritual Samos Sicilian Sicilian expedition Sicily social Socrates sophists Spartans Symposium Theramenes things Thirty thought thousand Thrasybulus Thucydides tion Tissaphernes trial voted wanted wealth Xenophon young