Monday, December 14, 2009

Meta-ancient-philosophy

Someone wrote to ask me for some things to read about the current state of the discipline of ancient philosophy. This is not easy. Other than Barnes' 'Bagpipe music', which might well put anyone off the whole business, I could think of the following:

J. Annas, 'Ancient philosophy for the twenty-first century', in B. Leiter ed. The future for philosophy (OUP, 2004), 25-43

H. Lesser, 'The history of ancient philosophy', in O. Leaman ed. The future of philosophy: towards the twenty-first century (Routledge, 1998), 14-24

And not much else. To be honest, I am not sure this is the best place to start thinking about the discipline. Much better just to get on and read some ancient philosophy (start with some Plato and work backwards and forwards from there) with some helpful guides. The Cambridge Companions are often a good place to begin (I would say that...) and there are some other interesting single-authored works like this one.

Any other suggestions?

1 comment:

Unknown said...

This one is good:

Gill, C. 2004. The Impact of Greek Philosophy on Contemporary Ethical Philosophy. In Greek Philosophy in the New Millenium. Essays in Honour of M. Robinson, edited by L. Rosetti. Sankt Augustin: Academia Verlag.