Book 1 call themes and recording
Folks,
We had a great call yesterday discussing Thucydides Book 1.
Key themes that emerged for us included:
– Origins of the Athenian Empire (and some background that Thucydides did not include about the Delian League)
– People, place and identity – how Thucydides refers to Greeks, Corinthians, Pelopenesians, etc
– The question of the start date and end date of the war – is it somewhat arbitrary to date it the way Thucydides does given that Greek civil war occured before and after the end of the war Thucydides describes?
– The question of the inevitability of war – Thucydides argues that because of growing Athenian power it was inevitable for Sparta and Athens to go to war. We discussed whether we agreed with his point-of-view
– Human nature and historical causality – are greed and fear the key drivers behind all human events, or at least behind wars?
Here’s the recording:
Download Thucydidese-03-11-06-Book1.m4a
Take a listen if you missed it. Please respond to this post with any thoughts.
Phil
P.S. Our next call on Book 2 will be Saturday, April 1 at 12 noon New York time (yes, it’s April Fools but we are doing the call 😉
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