Why Socrates Died

Why Socrates Died PDF Author: Robin Waterfield
Publisher: Emblem Editions
ISBN: 0771088639
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 290

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Book Description
A revisionist account of the most famous trial and execution in Western civilization — one with great resonance for modern society In the spring of 399 BCE, the elderly philosopher Socrates stood trial in his native Athens. The court was packed, and after being found guilty by his peers, Socrates died by drinking a cup of poison hemlock, his execution a defining moment in ancient civilization. Yet time has transmuted the facts into a fable. Aware of these myths, Robin Waterfield has examined the actual Greek sources, presenting a new Socrates, not an atheist or guru of a weird sect, but a deeply moral thinker, whose convictions stood in stark relief to those of his former disciple, Alcibiades, the hawkish and self-serving military leader. Refusing to surrender his beliefs even in the face of death, Socrates, as Waterfield reveals, was determined to save a morally decayed country that was tearing itself apart. Why Socrates Died is then not only a powerful revisionist book, but a work whose insights translate clearly from ancient Athens to the present day.

Why Socrates Died

Why Socrates Died PDF Author: Robin Waterfield
Publisher: Emblem Editions
ISBN: 0771088639
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 290

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Book Description
A revisionist account of the most famous trial and execution in Western civilization — one with great resonance for modern society In the spring of 399 BCE, the elderly philosopher Socrates stood trial in his native Athens. The court was packed, and after being found guilty by his peers, Socrates died by drinking a cup of poison hemlock, his execution a defining moment in ancient civilization. Yet time has transmuted the facts into a fable. Aware of these myths, Robin Waterfield has examined the actual Greek sources, presenting a new Socrates, not an atheist or guru of a weird sect, but a deeply moral thinker, whose convictions stood in stark relief to those of his former disciple, Alcibiades, the hawkish and self-serving military leader. Refusing to surrender his beliefs even in the face of death, Socrates, as Waterfield reveals, was determined to save a morally decayed country that was tearing itself apart. Why Socrates Died is then not only a powerful revisionist book, but a work whose insights translate clearly from ancient Athens to the present day.

Why Socrates Died: Dispelling the Myths

Why Socrates Died: Dispelling the Myths PDF Author: Robin Waterfield
Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
ISBN: 0393072908
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 294

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Book Description
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.

How Socrates Died

How Socrates Died PDF Author:
Publisher: Lulu.com
ISBN: 1565430654
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 210

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Book Description


The Death of Socrates

The Death of Socrates PDF Author: Emily R. Wilson
Publisher: Harvard University Press
ISBN: 9780674026834
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 264

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Book Description
Socrates's death in 399 BCE has figured largely in our world, shaping how we think about heroism and celebrity, religion and family life, state control and individual freedom--many of the key coordinates of Western culture. Wilson analyzes the enormous and enduring power the trial and death of Socrates has exerted over the Western imagination.

The Trial and Death of Socrates

The Trial and Death of Socrates PDF Author: Plato
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 213

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Book Description


The Trial and Death of Socrates

The Trial and Death of Socrates PDF Author: Plato
Publisher: Courier Corporation
ISBN: 0486111342
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 129

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Book Description
Among the most important and influential philosophical works in Western thought: the dialogues entitled Euthyphro, Apology, Crito and Phaedo. Translations by distinguished classical scholar Benjamin Jowett.

The Trial of Socrates

The Trial of Socrates PDF Author: I. F. Stone
Publisher: Anchor
ISBN: 0385260326
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 306

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Book Description
In unraveling the long-hidden issues of the most famous free speech case of all time, noted author I.F. Stone ranges far and wide over Roman as well as Greek history to present an engaging and rewarding introduction to classical antiquity and its relevance to society today. The New York Times called this national best-seller an "intellectual thriller."

Dying for Ideas

Dying for Ideas PDF Author: Costica Bradatan
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
ISBN: 1472525825
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 196

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Book Description
What do Socrates, Hypatia, Giordano Bruno, Thomas More, and Jan Patocka have in common? First, they were all faced one day with the most difficult of choices: stay faithful to your ideas and die or renounce them and stay alive. Second, they all chose to die. Their spectacular deaths have become not only an integral part of their biographies, but are also inseparable from their work. A "death for ideas" is a piece of philosophical work in its own right; Socrates may have never written a line, but his death is one of the greatest philosophical best-sellers of all time. Dying for Ideas explores the limit-situation in which philosophers find themselves when the only means of persuasion they can use is their own dying bodies and the public spectacle of their death. The book tells the story of the philosopher's encounter with death as seen from several angles: the tradition of philosophy as an art of living; the body as the site of self-transcending; death as a classical philosophical topic; taming death and self-fashioning; finally, the philosophers' scapegoating and their live performance of a martyr's death, followed by apotheosis and disappearance into myth. While rooted in the history of philosophy, Dying for Ideas is an exercise in breaking disciplinary boundaries. This is a book about Socrates and Heidegger, but also about Gandhi's "fasting unto death" and self-immolation; about Girard and Passolini, and self-fashioning and the art of the essay.

Apology

Apology PDF Author: Plato Plato
Publisher: Xist Publishing
ISBN: 1681956942
Category : Literary Collections
Languages : en
Pages : 63

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Book Description
Plato's Guide to the Good Life “The unexamined life is not worth living” -Apology, Plato An original account of the speech Socrates makes at the trial in which he is charged with not recognizing the gods recognized by the state, inventing new deities, and corrupting the youth of Athens. This Xist Classics edition has been professionally formatted for e-readers with a linked table of contents. This eBook also contains a bonus book club leadership guide and discussion questions. We hope you’ll share this book with your friends, neighbors and colleagues and can’t wait to hear what you have to say about it. Xist Publishing is a digital-first publisher. Xist Publishing creates books for the touchscreen generation and is dedicated to helping everyone develop a lifetime love of reading, no matter what form it takes

Ancient Greek Political Thought in Practice

Ancient Greek Political Thought in Practice PDF Author: Paul Cartledge
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 113948849X
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 194

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Book Description
Ancient Greece was a place of tremendous political experiment and innovation, and it was here too that the first serious political thinkers emerged. Using carefully selected case-studies, in this book Professor Cartledge investigates the dynamic interaction between ancient Greek political thought and practice from early historic times to the early Roman Empire. Of concern throughout are three major issues: first, the relationship of political thought and practice; second, the relevance of class and status to explaining political behaviour and thinking; third, democracy - its invention, development and expansion, and extinction, prior to its recent resuscitation and even apotheosis. In addition, monarchy in various forms and at different periods and the peculiar political structures of Sparta are treated in detail over a chronological range extending from Homer to Plutarch. The book provides an introduction to the topic for all students and non-specialists who appreciate the continued relevance of ancient Greece to political theory and practice today.