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Article: Why Socrates Died.(Books)(Book review)
- Article from:
- The Christian Science Monitor
- Article date:
- July 21, 2009
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2009 The Christian Science Publishing Society. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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Byline: Kevin Hartnett
Since his death in 399 BC, Socrates has lived well in history, enjoying a reputation as the West's first philosopher and its first dissident. According to Robin Waterfield, though, it was actually more common qualities - innocence, naivete, and maybe a little vanity - that got Socrates into trouble.
This is the central insight behind Why Socrates Died, Waterfield's remarkable and thoroughly original new book, which attempts to understand Socrates's trial and execution in light of the political and social upheaval racking his native Athens at the time he drank the fatal hemlock.
a*Why Socrates Dieda* opens with Socrates on ...