Download or read book Flattering the Demos written by Marlene K. Sokolon and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 2018-10-31 with total page 182 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: To understand the movements of democratic society one must appreciate fictional narratives and not depend on rationalistic argumentation and scientific analyses. This volume examines the lessons and effects of storytelling in democratic culture and political life, as it articulates our aspirations, communicates our fears, and criticizes our reality.
Download or read book Power and the People written by Alev Scott and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2020-09-01 with total page 151 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Democracy was born in Athens. From the city's founding myths to its golden age and chaotic downfall, this timely and well-informed political history is rich with lessons for contemporary America. Why did vital civic engagement and fair debate in Athens descend into populism and paralysis? Can we compare the demagogue Cleon to President Trump; the Athenian Empire to modern America; or the stubborn island of Melos to Brexit Britain? How did a second referendum save the Athenians from a bloodthirsty decision? Who were the last defenders of democracy in the changing, globalized world of the fourth century BC—and how do we unconsciously echo these leaders today? With verve and acuity, the heroics and the critics of Athenian democracy are brought to bear on today's politics, revealing in all its glories and its flaws the system that still survives to execute the power of the people.
Download or read book Taming Democracy written by Harvey Yunis and published by Cornell University Press. This book was released on 2018-05-31 with total page 335 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How does one speak to a large, diverse mass of ordinary, sovereign citizens and persuade them to render wise decisions? For Thucydides, Plato, and Demosthenes, who observed classical Athenian democracy in action, this was an urgent question. Harvey Yunis looks at how these three—historian, philosopher, politician respectively—explored the instructive potential of political rhetoric as a means of "taming democracy," Plato's metaphor for controlling the fractious demos through language. Yunis offers new insights into the ideas of the three thinkers: Thucydides' bipolar model of Periclean versus demagogic rhetoric; Plato's engagement with political rhetoric in the Gorgias, the Phaedrus, and the Laws; and Demosthenes' attempt both to instruct and to persuade his political audience. Yunis illuminates both the concrete historical problem of political deliberation in Athens and the intellectual and literary responses that the problem evoked. Few, if any, other books on classical Athens afford such a combination of perspectives from history, drama, philosophy, and politics. Writing with unusual clarity and cogency, Yunis translates all texts and explains the relevant issues. His book can profitably be read by anyone concerned with the issues at the heart of classical and contemporary democracy.
Download or read book Allusion Authority and Truth written by Phillip Mitsis and published by Walter de Gruyter. This book was released on 2010 with total page 469 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Questions about how ancient Greek texts establish their authority, reflect on each other, and project their own truths have become central for a wide range of recent critical discourses. In this volume, an influential group of international scholars examines these themes in a variety of poetic and rhetorical genres. The result is a series of striking and original readings from different critical perspectives that display the centrality of these questions for understanding the poetic and rhetorical aims of ancient Greek texts. Characterized by a combination of close attention to philological detail and theoretical sophistication, the essays in this volume make a compelling case for this kind of focused, critically informed dialogue about the nature of ancient textual praxis. Students of classical literature will find a wealth of critical insights and challenging new readings of many familiar texts.
Download or read book The Political Theory of Aristophanes written by Jeremy J. Mhire and published by SUNY Press. This book was released on 2014-04-01 with total page 372 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Examines the political dimensions of Aristophanes comic poetry. This original and wide-ranging collection of essays offers, for the first time, a comprehensive examination of the political dimensions of that madcap comic poet Aristophanes. Rejecting the claim that Aristophanes is little more than a mere comedian, the contributors to this fascinating volume demonstrate that Aristophanes deserves to be placed in the ranks of the greatest Greek political thinkers. As these essays reveal, all of Aristophanes plays treat issues of fundamental political importance, from war and peace, poverty and wealth, the relation between the sexes, demagoguery and democracy to the role of philosophy and poetry in political society. Accessible to students as well as scholars, The Political Theory of Aristophanes can be utilized easily in the classroom, but at the same time serve as a valuable source for those conducting more advanced research. Whether the field is political philosophy, classical studies, history, or literary criticism, this work will make it necessary to reconceptualize how we understand this great Athenian poet and force us to recognize the political ramifications and underpinnings of his uproarious comedies.
Download or read book The Facts on File Companion to Classical Drama written by John E. Thorburn and published by Infobase Publishing. This book was released on 2005 with total page 689 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Surveys important Greek and Roman authors, plays, characters, genres, historical figures and more.
Download or read book Oxford Studies in Ancient Philosophy XXX written by David Sedley and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2006-05-04 with total page 416 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This volume of original articles covers diverse aspects of ancient philosophy, including the work of Plato, Aristotle, and the stoics.
Download or read book The Sorrow and the Pity written by Brian M. Lavelle and published by Franz Steiner Verlag. This book was released on 1993 with total page 152 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Fifth century Athenians were expecially hostile to tyrants and tyranny as a result of Peisistratid treachery during the Persian Wars. Their hostility engendered a persistent refusal to acknowledge the truth of collaboration during the tyranny and so a revisionism which fundamentally affected the tradition about it. This study first examines the psychology of mass revisionism and of the early fifth century Athenians leading to their transfigurement of the tyrannicide/s; genos- and demos-traditions and topoi relating to the tyranny affirm and further define the distortion and deformative process affecting the historical record. This work aims to establish better bases for reconstructing Peisistratid history, but also for comprehending the psychology of Athenian antityrannism.
Download or read book Ruling Bodies written by Robin Varma and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 2022-05-23 with total page 173 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book is about an epochal shift in ideas that changed the nature and meaning of coercion in modern political thought. It begins with a review of Foucault, Arendt, and Habermas, and points out a discrepancy in the way each thinker understood coercion in modern politics. From here, Varma examines Plato’s Republic, Laws, and Gorgias to provide a framework and context for thinking about this. As the author shows, each work demonstrates a particular style of Platonic statecraft that corresponds to the amount of power the philosopher holds in a city. The Republic demonstrates the philosopher’s rule as a monarch; the Laws demonstrates his rule when he must share power with a few spirited statesmen; and the Gorgias demonstrates his rule in a democracy where power belongs to the people. Ultimately, Varma argues that the philosopher used coercion as a supplementary tool to help harmonize man’s soul with the heavens. When Hobbes recast the cosmos as matter in motion, however, power became the highest ordering principle for political life.
Download or read book You re Too Kind written by Richard Stengel and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2002-02-05 with total page 326 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From the primates to the ancient world all the way to Hollywood, "You're Too Kind" presents a primer on flattery--where it originated, its development through the ages, and its myriad uses in contemporary culture.
Download or read book Against Demagogues written by Prof. Robert C. Bartlett and published by Univ of California Press. This book was released on 2020-09-29 with total page 295 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Timeless comedies on resisting tyranny from one of history’s greatest comic playwrights. Against Demagogues presents Robert C. Bartlett's new translations of Aristophanes' most overtly political works, the Acharnians and the Knights. In these fantastically inventive, raucous, and raunchy comedies, the powerful politician Cleon proves to be democracy's greatest opponent. With unrivalled power, both plays make clear the dangers to which democracies are prone, especially the threats posed by external warfare, internal division, and class polarization. Combating the seductive allure of demagogues and the damage they cause, Against Demagogues disentangles Aristophanes' serious teachings from his many jokes and pratfalls, substantiating for modern readers his famous claim to "teach justice" while "making a comedy" of the city. The book features an interpretive essay for each play, expertly guiding readers through the most important plot points, explaining the significance of various characters, and shedding light on the meaning of the plays' often madcap episodes. Along with a contextualizing introduction, Bartlett offers extensive notes explaining the many political, literary, and religious references and allusions. Aristophanes' comedic skewering of the demagogue and his ruthless ambition—and of a community so ill-informed about the doings of its own government, so ready to believe in empty promises and idle flattery—cannot but resonate strongly with readers today around the world.
Download or read book Bringing the Passions Back In written by Rebecca Kingston and published by UBC Press. This book was released on 2008-05-20 with total page 280 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The rationalist ideal has been met with cynicism in progressive circles for undermining the role of emotion and passion in the public realm. By exploring the social and political implications of the emotions in the history of ideas, contributors examine new paradigms for liberalism and offer new appreciations of the potential for passion in political philosophy and practice. Bringing the Passions Back In draws upon the history of political theory to shed light on the place of emotions in politics; it illustrates how sophisticated thinking about the relationship between reason and passion can inform contemporary democratic political theory.
Download or read book Aristophanes Cavalry written by Robert Tordoff and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2023-12-28 with total page 197 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Offering for the first time a student introduction to Aristophanes' most explosive political satire, this volume is an essential guide to the context, themes and later reception of Cavalry. The ancient comedy is a fascinating insight into demagoguery and political rhetoric in classical Athens. These are subjects that resonate with a modern audience more now than ever before. Originally performed in 424 BCE, Cavalry was the first play Aristophanes directed himself and it was awarded first prize. It targets the Athenian demagogue, Cleon, who had risen to prominence since the death of Pericles and to pre-eminence after an audacious victory over Sparta in 425 BCE. In Cavalry, Aristophanes attacks Cleon's popularity with the masses, but also criticises the democracy itself as guilty of gullibility, self-interest and political shortsightedness. As the play shows, the only hope of escape from the crisis is for Athens to find a leader even more popular Cleon. And who better to be more foul-mouthed, depraved and shameless than a sausage-seller, if only because he turns out in the end to have a good heart and a true love of traditional Athenian values?
Download or read book Performance Culture and Athenian Democracy written by Simon Goldhill and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 1999-06-13 with total page 434 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This 1999 book discusses the ways performance is central to the practice and ideology of Athenian democracy.
Download or read book Nothing to Do with Dionysos written by John J. Winkler and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2020-07-21 with total page 434 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: These critically diverse and innovative essays are aimed at restoring the social context of ancient Greek drama. Theatrical productions, which included music and dancing, were civic events in honor of the god Dionysos and were attended by a politically stratified community, whose delegates handled all details from the seating arrangements to the qualifications of choral competitors. The growing complexity of these performances may have provoked the Athenian saying "nothing to do with Dionysos" implying that theater had lost its exclusive focus on its patron. This collection considers how individual plays and groups of dramas pertained to the concerns of the body politic and how these issues were presented in the convention of the stage and as centerpieces of civic ceremonies. The contributors, in addition to the editors, include Simon Goldhill, Jeffrey Henderson, David Konstan, Franois Lissarrague, Oddone Longo, Nicole Loraux, Josiah Ober, Ruth Padel, James Redfield, Niall W. Slater, Barry Strauss, and Jesper Svenbro.
Download or read book The Art of Plato written by R. B. Rutherford and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 1995 with total page 360 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book is not a study of Plato's philosophy, but a contribution to the literary interpretation of the dialogues, through analysis of their formal structure, characterisation, language and imagery. Among the dialogues considered in these interrelated essays are some of Plato's most admired and influential works, including the Gorgias, the Symposium, the Republic and the Phaedrus. Special attention is paid to the personality of Socrates, Plato's remarkable mentor, and to his interaction with the other characters in the dialogues. Rutherford also includes detailed discussion of particular problems such as the sources for our knowledge of Socrates, the origins of the dialogue form, Plato's use of myth, and the 'totalitarianism' of the Republic. The combination of sympathetic literary criticism with exact historical scholarship gives The Art of Plato its special qualities.
Download or read book Paedeia through laughter written by Aliki Lafkidou Dick and published by Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG. This book was released on 2015-07-24 with total page 156 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
