The Life of Alexander the Great

The biographies of nine Greek statesmen in this book are perfectly representative for the eternal battle between tyranny (oligarchy) and democracy, between oppression and freedom, between the few and the many, between the haves and the have-nots. The fighting took place within the Greek city States, but also among themselves and in foreign countries, because the oligarchs (tyrants) tried to export their political system. To make things worse, the tyrants fought among themselves, for `greed is the congenital disease of dynasties'. This relentless fighting was a disaster for Greece and its population: `Alas, for Greece, how many brave men have you killed with your own hands.' After all those suicidal wars, at the end of the book, Pyrrhus, king of Epirus, is confronted with a new and formidable imperial power, Rome. This book contains some astonishing historical corrections. E.g., not all Spartans were killing machines: `those who had shown cowardice in the battle ... had become so numerous that it was feared they might stir up a revolution.' (!) It shows us Plutarch as a severe critic of the few (`kings set an example of bad faith and treachery ... and believe that the man who shows the least regard for justice will always reap the greatest advantage'), on the side of the many (` (`it s wrong both in human and political terms to try to raise the standard in one section of society by demoralizing another') and as a `dove' (`expansion is superfluous to the well-being of a city'). All in all, it was a period of extreme barbarism. `Dynasties are full of men who murdered their sons, their mothers and their wives, while the murder of brothers had come to be regarded as a recognized precaution to be taken by all rulers to ensure their safety.' The mother of Alexander the Great, Olympias, took revenge on another widow of his father by roasting her and her infant son. This book is a must read for all those interested in the history of mankind.

Although Plutarch saves his best energy for the Romans, as a Greek citizen of the empire he could not help but produce some very fine essays on the great men from his homeland's glory days. In this Penguin volume some of the best are collected together. These are all "lives" from the period of the "Diadochi," the military successors to Alexander's legacy. There is one special feature this volume has that others in this valuable series do not: a dramatis personae of the main players in the dynastic struggles surrounding the death of Alexander. While the life of Alexander is the centerpiece to the collection, the lives of his generals who carried on after him are just as compelling reading. Filled with obsevations on character and moral philosophy, as all Plutarch's biographical writings are, these are some of the most entertaining stories in classical Western literature. As an example, the "Life of Pyrrhus" is absolutely priceless as a portrait of the fierce but frustrated warmonger with his weird visage and his penchant for performing miracles by placing his foot on the spleen of sick people. Plutarch employs humor and a sense of irony as he describes this brilliant general's character and career, the meandering leader who took on the early Romans for control of Italy. He provided an enduring lesson in the rise of the great republic, a lesson we all can learn from, in his all-too-hollow victories. As a matter of cultural literacy, this volume is full of information that educated people should know, and so I strongly recommend it to history students and literature students as well as philosophy students.

Plutarch in his "Lives Of The Noble Grecians And Romans" written around 100 C.E., sheds new light on Greek and Roman history from their Bronze Age beginnings, shrouded in myth, down through Alexander and late Republican Rome. Plutarch is the lens that we use today to view the Greco-Roman past; his work has shaped our perceptions of that world for 2,000 years. Plutarch writes of the rise of Roman Empire while Gibbon uses his scholarship to advance the story to write about its decline. He was a proud Greek that was equally effected by Roman culture, a Delphic priest, a leading Platonist, a moralist, educator and philosopher with a deep commitment as a first rate writer. Being a Roman citizen, Plutarch was afforded the opportunity to become an intimate friend to prominent Roman citizens and a member of the literary elite in the court of Emperor Trajan. Plutarch's influence and enormous popularity during and after the Renaissance is legendary among classicist. Plutarch's "Lives", served as the sourcebook for Shakespeare's Roman Plays "Julius Caesar", "Antony and Cleopatra" and "Coriolanus". By the way Plutarch is even the only contemporary source of all the biographical information on Cleopatra, whom he writes about in his biographies of Julius Caesar, Mark Antony and Octavian. Thomas Jefferson wrote to his nephew that there were three books every gentleman had to have familiarity with; Plutarch's "Lives", Livy's "History of Rome" and Virgil's Aeneid. In fact all the founding fathers of note had read Plutarch and learned much from his fifty biographies of noble men of Greece and Rome. When Hamilton, Jay and Madison write "The Federalist Papers" they use many examples of good and bad leadership traits that they read in Plutarch's work. His biographies are a great study in human character and what motivates leaders to decide and act the way they do, this masterpiece has proven to be still prescient today. If you are truly interested in a classical education, put this book on the top of your list! I recommend this book to anyone who is interested in political philosophy, and history.

Plutarch was a Greek scholar living in the Roman Empire. He was not a historian, per se, but rather a biographer who used the lives of famous Greeks and Romans to illustrate strengths and weaknesses of character, how they impacted events, and how events impacted them. He wrote his biographies in pairs, matching a Greek and Roman whose lives, in his view, exemplified common traits or themes. His pairings being generally rather superficial, Penguin has chosen to publish the individual "Lives" in chronological groupings. The nine presented in "The Age Of Alexander" include Plutarch's biography of Alexander the Great along with those of eight famous Greeks from the same period.Writing during the reigns of Trajan and Hadrian, Plutarch was already dealing with people from hundreds of years in his past. Fortunately for us, as his writing shows, he still had a lot of evidence to draw on. Frequently mentioned are contemporary accounts and, in the case of Alexander, letters written by Alexander himself, which apparently still existed in Plututarch's time. Sometimes he cites more than one source in cases where accounts disagree. The richness of Plutarch's sources is valuable because so much of that ancient source material is now lost.Plutarch is at his best in describing dramatic events and when commenting on the strengths and weaknesses of his subjects. As reading material, this book could hardly be called a "page-turner" in the contemporary sense of that term, but you don't have to be a student of history to appreciate the dramatic, and often violent, nature of the times and of the lives of the men covered in this collection. Only one of them died in bed. Life was often violent and short, and the violence was gratuitous. A man whose deeds were out of favor might well be treated to the sight of his family being executed before being dispatched himself.Personally, I'm more a fan of Roman history than the Greeks (although Alexander is certainly a fascinating character), and the Greeks covered in this book are generally much less familiar to me than those of the Romans contained in other volumes. Nevertheless, this is classic literature of a high order. Plutarch is a great storyteller, and his insightful and anecdotal style is never dull. Further, his work is one of those rare examples of ancient writing and scholarship that have survived, and in that sense alone his "Lives" are a treasure. "The Age Of Alexander" isn't the easiest reading you'll find, but it is both interesting and rewarding. It's probably not everyone's cup of tea, but give it a try. You may just find it as enjoyable as I do.

This edition combines great greek lives, but most will be buying it because of Alexander the Great. Originally intended to be published as one of his "Parallel Lives" series with Caesar, this short biography of Alexander is one of the three main sources used to derive what little information we have on Alexander. It is also the only history that survives that discusses his childhood. Not necessarily accurate, but Plutarch never claimed to be a historian. While not always successful, he does attempt to explain Alexander's complicated personality. A must read for Alexanderophiles.