Sir Anthony Kenny has surely done more than any other single scholar to stimulate the recent upsurge of critical attention to the Eudemian Ethics, the less familiar version of Aristotle's ethics handed down to us from antiquity. In his first (of three) full-length treatments of this work (viz. The Aristotelian Ethics [1978]) K. confronted the crucial problem posed by the presence of the common or disputed middle books of these separate treatises, and attempted to determine definitively their likely original context. Most strikingly, he conceived and executed a comparative statistical study of machine-readable versions of three separate portions of our Greek texts, i.e. the 7 uniquely Eth. Nic. books (= 1–4, 8–10), those to be found only in the Eth. Eud. (1–3, 7–8) as well as the middle books themselves (Eth. Nic. 5–7 = Eth. Eud. 4–6). The general results of this work are fairly widely known, and even ‘diehard’ fans of the Eth. Nic.-side of the controversy routinely accept that the linguistic environment provided by the Eth. Eud. as a whole has been shown to be more ‘ecologically friendly’ to the disputed books than the Eth. Nic. surround. K. updated his pioneering stylometric analysis in the first appendix to his 1992 Aristotle on the Perfect Life, modifying some of his earlier claims and responding to his most influential critics. The main lesson we should take away from this prior body of work is that we should not quote a middle book passage against the Eth. Eud. as though it comes from the other (more famous) Eth. Nic., which is assumed to trump the earlier, inferior one (as did Jaeger, e.g). Indeed, the shoe is on the other foot, so to speak, and the best way to show this is to translate all eight books of the Eth. Eud. as one, reasonably coherent, whole and this translation does just that for the first time in ‘clear and readable English that preserves Aristotle's sense, rather than to achieve word-for-word correspondence with the original’ (p. xxix). K. satisfactorily accomplishes that goal, gracefully, and with a full appreciation of the many textual difficulties the Eth. Eud. raises, relying, of course, on his previous work and the judicious ‘select bibliography’.
To get a feel for what this notable entry in the Oxford World's Classics series provides, it will be useful to compare K.'s phrasing with that of Michael Woods, whose Clarendon translation of three Eth. Eud. books with commentary went into a 2nd ed. in 1992, largely to accommodate the long-delayed 1991 OCT text of Walzer and Mingay. K., too, adopts this text but does not always accept its emendations, offering a few of his own. He often prefers the original manuscripts which, with ‘a little patience’, can yield good sense. In describing the ergon of the soul in 2.1.1219b23–39, in a crucial, summarising passage leading to the Eth. Eud.'s distinctive definition of eudaimonia, K. translates the unbroken OCT paragraph as follows:
Let us postulate that the work of the soul is to be alive* – or to exercise life while awake, since in sleep the soul is idling and at rest. So, since the work of the soul and of its virtue must be one and the same, the work of its virtue will be a virtuous life. This, then, is the complete good, which, as we saw, is happiness. This is evident if you recall that we assumed that happiness is the best thing, and that the ends, that is to say, the best of goods, are in the soul, and that things in the soul are either states or activities.* From these assumptions, and from the premisses that an activity is better than a disposition, and that the best activity is the activity of the best state, and that virtue is the best state, it follows that the activity of the virtue of the soul is the best thing of all. But happiness, as we saw, is the best of all things; consequently, happiness is the activity of a good soul. We also saw that happiness is something complete, and from this and the premisses that a life can be complete or incomplete, and that virtue likewise can be total or partial, and that the activity of what is incomplete is itself incomplete, it follows that happiness is the activity of a complete life in accordance with complete virtue.
K.'s asterisks signal the presence of ‘explanatory notes’ at the back which clarify how he is taking a particular phrase, or what reading he adopts at this point in the text, or offer brief explanations of Aristotelian doctrine that neophytes might need. There is also a ‘glossary of Greek terms’ as well as a very useful five-page index. K.'s introduction is basic but informative about the chief differences between the Eth. Eud. and Eth. Nic., while outlining the argument of the whole to come as well as providing a brief account of the afterlife of Aristotle's ethics. Since this work is designed for non-specialists and its translations are more fluid than the original, it may seem unfair to compare it with W.'s version, since that was designed to remain as close as possible to the original, in line with the general goals of its series, and to be supplemented by detailed study of the philosophical commentary. Nevertheless, one can perhaps glean from a brief comparison what is to be gained by having students read (the smoother?) K. rather than W. to get a sense of the Eth. Eud. as a whole:
Now, let us assume that the function of the soul is to make things live, but that is an employment and a waking state, since sleep is an idle and inactive state.
So, as the function of the soul and its excellence must be one and the same, the function of its excellence is a good life. This, then, is the final good, that we agreed to be happiness. It is evident from our assumptions (happiness was assumed to be the best thing, and ends – the best among goods – are in the soul; but things in the soul are states or activities), since the activity is better than the disposition, and the best activity is of the best state, and virtue is the best state, that the activity of the virtue of the soul must be the best thing.
But happiness too was said to be the best thing: so happiness is activity of a good soul. Now as happiness was agreed to be something complete, and life may be complete or incomplete – and this holds with excellence also (in the one case it is total, in the other partial) – and the activity of what is incomplete is itself incomplete, happiness must be activity of a complete life in accordance with complete virtue. (Woods's tr.)
Clearly, the aims of these rival translations are very different and W. treats only Books 1, 2 and 8 on the general assumption that these are the most interestingly different from their Eth. Nic. counterparts; still, K.'s effort to give us the whole in a digestible form is most welcome.
