Maria Michela Sassi's masterful 2009 volume on the origins and nature of early Greek philosophy is now available in an updated English translation.Footnote ¹ Sassi's aim is not to provide a primer of the views of individual thinkers. Rather, she seeks to scrutinize what sense we can make of attempts to unravel the ‘origins’ of philosophy. Her work is useful not only for its wide-ranging assessment of the evidence, including that from beyond the central Mediterranean, but also for its careful engagement with central works of scholarship. Sassi seeks to defend the inherently ‘philosophical’ nature of those who presented their views about the nature of the cosmos (and more), prior to the efforts of Plato and Aristotle to establish the identity of philosophy itself. She is particularly keen to defend the value of Aristotle's account of his predecessors against those who are too hasty to dismiss it as self-serving. For her, ‘Aristotle's exposition [of the beginnings of philosophy] is fundamentally correct’ (xv), and she makes a persuasive and engaging case for this point, working with a conception of philosophy as characterized by a particular kind of critical attitude towards explanations.

Sassi's own critical response to the various explanations of the origin of philosophy is to argue for the need to recognize a range of significant factors and, indeed, origins. Her first chapter (‘Thales, Father of Philosophy?’) offers a summary of the history of the categorization and conceptualization of ‘Presocratic’ philosophy. She is especially concerned to consider the degree to which Thales represents a true starting point as opposed to a mere point of continuity with Eastern thought. She is also, as is inevitable, interested in the relation between logos and muthos, arguing against a naïve separation of these categories and for a more nuanced understanding of their relation than has often been the case. Her account of the place of Cornford and Burkert in shaping common narratives about the nature of early Greek philosophy is enlightening. Although she wants to acknowledge some continuity with Eastern thought, she is insistent that what matters in our assessment of the Greeks is the question of how they transform and innovate what they inherit. In Chapter 2 (‘Philosophy in the Cosmogonies’), Sassi turns to the question of the development of philosophical explanations of the cosmos, presenting a relatively standard account of a move away from a concern with the influence of the gods. Again, her exposition is more nuanced than many, particularly in her emphasis on the place of divinity even within these philosophical explanations. She considers a variety of factors in this development, including the interesting (although, I think, necessarily speculative) claim, made in relation to Anaximander, that the ‘deanthropomorphization of nature takes place through a search for linguistic transparency’ (41). Here Vernant, Popper, and Pherecydes provide her with useful case studies against which to develop her interpretation.

In her third chapter (‘Writing Experiments’), Sassi explores the connection between egotism and innovation in relation to and as supported by the development of writing as a means of communicating philosophical teaching. She focuses on Anaximander, Xenophanes, and Heraclitus and seeks to stress the connection of the adoption of prose to the assertion of personal authority. She presents a careful and plausible assessment of issues of orality and audience, and notes Heraclitus as the figure most explicitly addressing an audience of readers as well as auditors. Chapter 4 (‘Adventures of the Soul’) explores epistemology as linked to psychology and traces accounts of the soul from Homer onwards. Sassi offers a close treatment of Heraclitus on the relation between the soul and the cosmos and suggests that Empedocles is (albeit without apparent success) innovating in trying to provide a unified account of metempsychosis and soul–body interaction. In her final chapter (‘Voices of Authority’), Sassi investigates the relation between philosophy and poetry and returns to the question of authority. She asserts that, while poetry and philosophy may cohabit in the verses of Parmenides and Empedocles, ‘the products of this coexistence…are closer to philosophy than to poetry’ (141), although elsewhere she acknowledges that both figures are more likely to have conceived of themselves as poets than as philosophers. She also acknowledges the complexity of the relation between poetic and philosophical authority within the context of a development of philosophical prose.

Sassi's work is immensely rich and rewarding and necessary reading for any scholar with an interest in the early history of Western philosophy. Michele Asuni's translation is lucid and enjoyable and it is a great advantage that this volume is now available to readers not able to access it in its original Italian edition.

Christopher Moore and Christopher C. Raymond have provided an extremely valuable new translation of Plato's enigmatic and somewhat understudied Charmides in the Hackett series.Footnote ² Moore and Raymond are explicit about their aims in producing the volume, which includes introduction, notes, and analysis: ‘readability, argumentative clarity, and descriptive accuracy’ (vii). Scholars of the Charmides will be particularly interested in the translators’ decision to render sōphrosunē as ‘discipline’. They defend this choice as supported by the dialogue's historical, specifically military, context and suggest that it may be particularly ‘apt for seminar discussion’ by modern readers (viii). A useful introduction sets the dialogue within the context of the Platonic corpus and provides background information on Socrates and his interlocutors. It also presents a thorough introduction to issues surrounding the nature of (and difficulties in translating) sōphrosunē, as well outlining significant questions about the dialogue's account of self-knowledge. The lively translation includes generous notes, and the detailed analysis demonstrates the authors’ attention to historical, literary, and philosophical concerns – as well as to the significant connections between them. This volume will provide a useful resource for students of the dialogue, and the availability of a reasonably priced and up-to-date translation will hopefully stimulate wider study of the Charmides, particularly at undergraduate and graduate level. This translation is very well designed to support seminar discussions of the dialogue.

Like the Charmides, the Menexenus has not always attracted as much attention as it deserves. Harold Parker and Jan Maximilian Robitzsch present a collected volume of essays which has its origins in a 2014 conference.Footnote ³ The volume comprises a brief introduction surveying the state of the scholarship on the Menexenus and introducing key themes covered by the chapters. Nine essays (none by women) demonstrate the wealth of approaches and interpretations that this relatively brief dialogue can stimulate if taken seriously (even if taken seriously as a work of mere ‘play’). One of the chapters is a reprint of Charles Kahn's seminal 1963 article ‘Plato's Funeral Oration: The Motive of the Menexenus’, which champions an intertextual reading of the dialogue against Pericles’ Funeral Speech in Thucydides and Lysias’ Epitaphios. Mark Zelcer's chapter (‘Reading the Menexenus Intertextually’) responds to and develops Kahn's intertextual reading to argue that the attribution within the dialogue of both Pericles’ and Socrates’ speeches to Aspasia is central to our understanding of its meaning. Adopting Bakhtin's reading of Platonic dialogue as presenting a complete and unified argument, Zelcer argues that Socrates’ speech must be put in detailed dialogue with Pericles’ Funeral Speech. He presents four examples of this manner of reading and suggests that the Menexenus offers repeated corrections to Pericles’ position. Zelcer even suggests that Menexenus himself is a proxy for Pericles within the dialogue (although where Thucydides stands within the dialogue between the two texts is a question left undiscussed).

Brian Marrin (‘The Rhetoric of Natural Law in Plato's Menexenus’) addresses the question of the dialogue's claim concerning the naturalness of Athenian nomos. He argues that this position is inconsistent with that set out in other Platonic dialogues, as well as being incoherent in its presentation in the Menexenus. He suggests that the incoherence of the account should be understood as a deliberate decision to compromise philosophical rigour for the sake of rhetorical effect and the political reality of the need for civic reconciliation. Étienne Helmer (‘Does the Political Regime Feed and Rear the Citizens? Trophē in Plato's Menexenus and His Other Political Dialogues’) also considers the Menexenus against Plato's other political writings, specifically the Statesman, Laws, and Republic. Helmer discusses the value of Loraux's influential reading of the Menexenus as ‘serious play’ aimed at deconstructing the rhetoric of funeral orations. Focusing on the language of trophē, he argues that the Menexenus represents a deliberately distorted instantiation of the noble lie, adapting Platonic political theory to a specific rhetorical and pragmatic context.

In the volume's final chapter (‘“Since We Are Two Alone:” Socratic Paideia in the Menexenus’), Clifford Robinson presents a reading of the Menexenus as composed to appeal specifically to Menexenus, arguing that it thus represents the appropriation of civic rhetoric for the purpose of philosophical paideia. Surveying evidence from the Lysis and Phaedo to establish the character of Menexenus, Robinson identifies aspects of the speech which may suggest that it is intended to appeal particularly to him. Since these elements of his character are that he is at about the right age and of the right aristocratic rank, that he has an enthusiasm for rhetoric, and that he may (speculatively) be a war orphan, it is hard to see how Menexenus stands out from many other similar young men to whom Socrates might have addressed such a speech. But Robinson notes this possible objection and suggests that Menexenus is present in the dialogue as an exemplar.

The volume includes an extremely useful bibliography covering literature on the Menexenus in English, French, German, and Italian. It presents a usefully wide range of stimulating perspectives on Plato's Menexenus and will be of value not only to those with an interest in the Menexenus specifically, but also to those working on Plato's treatment of rhetoric and his political thought.

Aristotle's Meteorologica is yet another rather neglected text. As Malcolm Wilson notes in his introduction, there is currently no complete commentary on this work in English. Wilson's monograph is the first full-length study in any modern language and represents an attempt to rehabilitate it as the subject of serious study irrespective of its meteorological inaccuracies.Footnote ⁴ He attempts to demonstrate that, even if the Meteorologica is generally wrong, it is ‘wrong in profoundly interesting and significant ways’ (3). The book is divided into two parts. The first attempts to place the Meteorologica in context and to assess its general methodology. The second is a close study of Aristotle's accounts of various meteorological phenomena, following the order in which he treats them.

Part I (‘Methodology and Structure’) comprises five chapters. In the first (‘The Rebirth of Meteorology’), Wilson accepts the standard position that the Meteorologica is generally empirical in its treatment of endoxa. He argues that this represents Aristotle's perception that his predecessors had failed by treating specific phenomena only in terms of general cosmic principles and thus putting them in conflict with the evidence of the senses, rather than as part of an integral science deserving special attention. Chapter 2 (‘From Elements to Exhalations’) seeks to offer a new account of the manner in which the two-exhalation theory of the Meteorologica represents a transformation of the four-element theory of the De caelo via the introduction of a controlling celestial principle. Having established the origins of the two exhalations, Wilson uses Chapter 3 (‘The Exhalations’) to consider the connection between Aristotle's two-exhalation theory and the theories of his predecessors, arguing in particular for a connection to Heraclitus’ physics. This connection emphasizes Aristotle's treatment of his two exhalations as analogous, rather than as opposites. Chapter 4 (‘The Biological Method’) provides a central plank of Wilson's argument in demonstrating the methodological and classificatory similarities between the Meteorologica and the biological works. The final chapter of the section (‘Teleology in the Meteorologica’) addresses the apparent lack of a final cause at work within the Meteorologica, a point of particular contrast with the biological works. For Wilson the lack of teleology allows Aristotle to position meteorological phenomena as intermediary between a unified cosmos and the diversity of animals within it.

In Part II, Wilson focuses on individual phenomena in turn, beginning with what he calls the ‘kapnosphere’. He provides detailed analysis and is particularly enlightening when tracing relations and differences between Aristotle's accounts and those of his predecessors. Following the ‘kapnosphere’, Wilson looks at Aristotle's explanation of condensation and precipitation, fresh waters, the sea, winds, earthquakes and ‘stormy phenomena’, reflections, and finally metals and minerals. Chapter 8's discussion of Aristotle on fresh water and Chapter 9 on the sea are particularly interesting for their engagement with his use of the corroborative evidence of social and mythic memory to challenge the ‘entropist’ theories of his predecessors.

Part I of Wilson's monograph is more likely to appeal to those not already convinced that the Meteorologica is a text worth taking seriously. Part II is packed with insights that will be of value to those studying ancient natural philosophy in general. Overall, the book represents a persuasive case for the value of engaging with this neglected text as a whole.

Theokritos Kouremenos provides a detailed discussion of some of the material against which the Meteorologica is always going to be judged: the account of the heavens in De caelo.Footnote ⁵ His first central claim is that Aristotle's unified account of the substance of all celestial bodies developed from the starting point of a commitment to this heavenly substance as the stuff of stars specifically. His second major claim is that, contrary to the standard interpretation, Aristotle is never committed to the theory of homocentric spheres set out in De caelo. The volume is clearly structured and presents detailed and original argument. It offers an interesting challenge to the standard accounts of Aristotelian cosmology.

Those teaching, or seeking to learn about, Hellenistic philosophy can choose from a range of valuable introductory works. John Sellars offers an engaging and useful new contribution to the field, likely to appeal to undergraduates, graduate students, and interested non-experts.Footnote ⁶ Rather than choosing to divide his account between the schools, Sellars presents thematic chapters (e.g. ‘Knowledge’, ‘The Good’, ‘Free Will’, etc.), within which he sets out the views of major figures and schools and considers the relations and contrasts between them. In addition, he provides a useful introductory chapter, considering the historical and philosophical context of Hellenistic philosophy. In his final chapter (‘What Was Hellenistic Philosophy?’), he assesses the validity of the characterization of Hellenistic philosophy as primarily therapeutic, seeking to emphasize that such an understanding should not be allowed to squeeze out the significance of the pursuit of knowledge itself. Sellars includes an tantalizingly brief appendix on the question of possible relations between Hellenistic and Indian philosophy, as well as a chronology and guide to Hellenistic thinkers, a guide to further reading, and an extensive bibliography.

Stephen L. Clark presents a stimulating and original discussion of the ‘metaphorical’ in Plotinus.Footnote ⁷ His aim is not simply to discuss the explicit metaphors, but also to consider what else might usefully be considered metaphorical for those seeking to find something relevant to themselves in Plotinus’ teachings. Clark is clear that his aim is to bridge academic and esoteric readings of Plotinus and to take seriously whatever ethics can be constructed out of the text. He offers an allusive, imaginative, and personal account of what he takes to be the spirit of Plotinus’ language. He is, he says, trying to get us ‘to listen to what he [Plotinus] means, and not just what he seems to say’ (91).

The volume is divided into five parts. The first (‘Prologomena’) contains four chapters which set out the context within and methodology with which Clark thinks we should approach Plotinus. His opening chapter (‘Why Read Plotinus?’) is particularly provocative, working from biographical and historical context to a brief defence of reading Plotinus not simply as a useful contrast to modern thinking, but as possibly correct on important questions. Chapter 2 (‘How to Read Plotinus’) offers some hints as to the approach Clark intends to take, emphasizing his desire to avoid the mistake of confusing ‘scholastic expertise for philosophical insight’ (18). Chapters 3 (‘Theories about Metaphor’) and 4 (‘Dialectic’) present in turn a subtle account of the nature of metaphor as something more complex than simply appropriating a concrete idea to express abstract meaning, and a consideration of the role of dialectic as a tool to pursue the transformative aims of philosophy.

Part II (‘Metaphorically Speaking’) contains seven chapters treating individual metaphors familiar to readers of Plotinus (e.g. ‘On Becoming Love’, ‘Dancing’, ‘Remembering and Forgetting’, etc.). In each case, Clark's aim is not to offer a straightforward analysis and interpretation of the Plotinian text, but rather to consider the plurality of possibilities that such metaphors might encourage. He seeks to encourage us to consider what Plotinus might mean by his metaphors within the cultural context in which he produces them but also what those metaphors might mean for us as readers approaching them from a different context. Throughout, Clark's concern is with the transformative ethical potential of Plotinus’ metaphors, both as Plotinus conceived of it and as it might affect us.

Part III (‘The Plotinian Imaginary’) turns to aspects of Plotinus’ writing, such as his use of myths and his references to demons, which might seem to be in some sense closed off from us as modern readers as a result of chronological or cultural distance. Again, Clark's concern is not simply to ‘decode’ such images, or to rationalize them. Rather, he seeks to establish what transformative value they may have for us as we encounter Plotinus. Part IV (‘Understanding the Hypostases’) applies Clark's approach to the traditional Plotinian principles of ‘The One’, ‘Nous’, and ‘Soul’, as well as ‘Matter’ and ‘Nature’. Part V offers a brief conclusion on ‘The Plotinian Way’, which reiterates Clark's interest in ‘how Plotinus would have us live here-now, and what the world of our experience might seem if we reformed our wills and imagination, whether or not the universe is as he argued that it was’ (297). In fact, Clark suggests that reading metaphorically what others might take to be the more literal parts of Plotinus’ teaching provides us with new ethical insights relevant to ourselves.

Plotinus is, as Danielle A. Layne and Harold Tarrant explain in the introduction to their edited volume on The Neoplatonic Socrates,Footnote ⁸ partly responsible for the misperception that the Neoplatonists were disengaged from the figure of Socrates and Socratic concerns. The volume presents ten chapters, arranged chronologically and more or less thematically, which demonstrate a range of approaches to Socrates, frequently via engagement with Proclus’ Commentary on the Alcibiades and Hermias’ Commentary on the Phaedrus. The majority focus on the different treatments and interpretations offered of the character and activity of Socrates. In their introduction, the editors present a survey of the presence of Socrates within Neoplatonic texts, noting explicit interest after Iamblichus. They suggest, quite plausibly, that considering such approaches will enhance our own understanding of both Neoplatonism and Socrates and offer lessons for contemporary readers of Plato.

Geert Roskam (‘Socratic Love in Neoplatonism’) offers a discussion of the Neoplatonist reception of the issue of Socrates’ erotic activities and, in particular, to what degree such activities were motivated by or involved corporeal concerns. Taking Lucian's attack on the notion of ‘high-minded love’ as a counter-example, Roskam focuses on Hermias’ Commentary on the Phaedrus and its account of Socrates as someone who ‘through his purifying power and providential care…saves the young Phaedrus by lifting him up to the intellectual realm of true Beauty’ (28). Roskam demonstrates how Hermias maintains his position even in the face of Socrates’ apparent endorsement of bodily love in the Palinode. Noting that Hermias emphasizes and ignores certain aspects of the text as best fits his agenda, Roskam asks his reader to consider to what degree modern readings of Socrates differ in this respect.

John F. Finnamore (‘Plutarch and Apuleius on Socrates’ Daimonion’) and Crystal Addey (‘The Daimonion of Socrates: Daimones and Divination in Neoplatonism’) both present discussions of the Neoplatonist reception of Socrates’ daimonion. Addey considers this within the context of the Neoplatonic interest in Socrates not only as a paradigm philosopher but also as a sage or holy man, with a focus on Proclus’ Commentary on the Alcibiades. Addey demonstrates that, in contrast to modern readings which seek to establish Socrates as an arch-rationalist and which must therefore rationalize his inner voice, there is no conflict for Neoplatonists between the characterization of Socrates as a great rationalist and his status as a sage. In fact, the two are mutually inclusive in Neoplatonic thought: ‘Socrates exemplifies the culmination of the philosophical life – the enlightened mystic who lives and acts in assimilation of the divine’ (52). The Neoplatonists are content to attribute Socrates’ inner voice to a guardian spirit and Proclus takes Socrates’ ability to hear his daimonion as evidence that he is a genuine seer, with divination as protreptic to philosophical inquiry. Again, we see how modern readings may benefit from comparing themselves to Neoplatonist approaches.

Danielle A. Layne's discussion of Neoplatonic hermeneutics (‘The Character of Socrates and the Good of Dialogue Form: Neoplatonic Hermeneutics’) offers an enlightening discussion of the Neoplatonist treatment of dialogue form, which notably involves an allegorical reading of preludes, settings, characters, etc. Layne argues that, because of this approach, Neoplatonists tended to avoid conflating Socrates and Plato in their reading of the dialogues. She focuses on Proclus as reading the texts as complex wholes which should be read primarily as aiming to initiate a particular way of life. In the only chapter to focus on a Socratic tenet as such, Marilyn Lawrence considers the Neoplatonist reception of the Socratic denial of akrasia (‘Akrasia and Enkrateia in Simplicius’ Commentary on Epictetus’ Encheiridion’). Lawrence turns to Simplicius’ commentary on Epictetus’ Encheiridion to argue that it seeks to harmonize Socratic intellectualism with the evidence that people can and do err knowingly by drawing a distinction between Socrates as a sage and the rest of us as aspirants ‘who must form proper habits before akrasia can be denied’ (129).

The editors include a very brief but useful conclusion, which offers suggestions for areas of further research, as well as an appendix listing some of the central authors and texts relevant to the Neoplatonist reception of Socrates.

In 1987, Erik Ostenfeld published a brief volume tackling the nature of Platonic and Aristotelian psychology and, in particular, its relevance to the mind–body question. Ostenfeld's premise is that the ancient tradition, free as it is from the Cartesian influences that have shaped the modern debate, provides a valuable alternative account. A new, updated edition is now available,Footnote ⁹ including a final chapter surveying the scholarship published on the issue since the original edition appeared.