This is an exceptional commentary on the first three Enneads of Plotinus along with Porphyry's Life of Plotinus, and will be a standard reference on Plotinus’ philosophical thought as well as the historical and cultural context of the Enneads for many years to come. An English translation of the notes to his translation of the Enneads into modern Greek, K. has since taken the opportunity to update and incorporate some of the recent scholarship on Plotinus that has been published since his volumes first appeared in the 1990s and early 2000s. In many ways, then, this volume is the definitive version of K.'s impressive and extremely useful commentary on Plotinus’ first three Enneads and has superseded these earlier editions. Two further volumes of English translation are currently planned, which will cover Enneads 4–6. K. is in the process of completing his modern Greek translation and study of the text, with the volumes devoted to Ennead 6 still forthcoming.

K.'s approach to Plotinus is simultaneously illuminating and probing. The bibliography to K.'s commentary will appear in Volume 3 of the English translation, but is already available online from Princeton University Press, and encompasses a remarkable proportion of the research on Plotinus in a modern European language since Ficino's Latin translation in the fifteenth century.Footnote ¹ K.'s stated goal is to make visible the background ‘of each treatise and provide the means necessary for placing the emergence and development of Plotinus’ thought within its specific historical context’ (p. x). In doing so, K. also ranges widely over cultural, philosophical, literary and historical topics that are comparatively rare for focused philosophical analyses such as his, but which also are remarkable not only for providing the context of Plotinus’ thought in response to philosophical predecessors like Plato, Aristotle, Middle Platonists and the Stoics, but also contemporary literary and historical figures such as Ammonius Saccas, historical Roman politicians and personages, and even erotic literature of the day (see p. 211).

K. is also motivated by the enormous historical influence of Plotinus (as he says in the preface to the English edition, one of his original impetuses for writing on Plotinus was the idea that Plotinus serves as ‘a common basis for the philosophical thinking of all three great cultures that flourished in Europe and the Middle East for centuries after his death’, p. viii), though his remarks on this point are more contained but nevertheless still valuable, as for instance when discussing the influence of Plotinus on later Arabic and Byzantine thought.

K.'s procedure is to offer critical introduction to each individual treatise, followed by a line-by-line commentary to Plotinus’ text. An introduction and commentary on Porphyry's Vita Plotini serves as an introduction to Plotinus’ life and thought as a whole. The picture of Plotinus that emerges from K.'s commentary is interesting and novel in several respects. K., against some scholars who find value in a chronological reading of Plotinus’ treatises, versus the systematic ordering produced by Porphyry, does not find much evidence of any kind of philosophical development in Plotinus’ thought (pp. xi, 38–9), and so very little that is illuminating from this approach. Instead, K. finds in Plotinus a philosopher whose thought is more or less complete even at the beginning of his written career, which K. notes begins relatively late in Plotinus’ life, at approximately the age of 49–50 (cf. pp. 7–9, 13, 40–1). K. observes a strong affinity between the teaching of Plotinus and his teacher Ammonius Saccas, and suggests some specifics of Ammonius’ teaching, in particular that he pursued a ‘harmonization’ of Plato and Aristotle (cf. pp. 28–9, 34) that was to be so influential for all subsequent Neoplatonists. Further, K., by close textual analysis, provides a new and very convincing date for Plotinus’ birth, fixing it to either July or very early August 204 c.e., brilliantly resolving what had previously been seen as a mass of apparently conflicting testimonies within Porphyry's Vita (see p. 38).

Turning to the main commentary on Enneads 1–3, K.'s reading is philosophically astute and perspicuous. A more detailed commentary on the Enneads could probably be written, but it will likely not come from a single hand, and probably will not be forthcoming for a long time at that. A detailed account of K.'s astute comments is beyond the scope of this review, but it should be noted that he provides implicit (and at times explicit, cf. p. 149) support for Porphyry's systematic ordering of the Enneads by unpacking some of the doctrinal and methodological connections between Plotinus’ treatises. Ennead 1, according to K., explores ‘the metaphysical, psychological, and epistemological underpinning of ethics’ (p. xiv). Ennead 2 examines natural philosophy, but also the connection between Plotinus’ ‘complex metaphysical theories’ and ‘the world of our common, everyday experience’ (p. xiv). Hence Ennead 2 includes discussions of the heavens, matter and evil, and polemics against the incorrect understandings of these things by sects like the Gnostics. Ennead 3 once again examines physical reality, but this time in more general connection with Plotinus’ metaphysical system as a whole. In the process, K. corrects both specific (such as the misattribution of the Arabic Theology of Aristotle to Plotinus’ classroom activities in Rome, p. 37) and general misunderstandings (such as the widely held view even among specialists that hupostasis is a technical term in Plotinus; K. notes that it is not, p. 229). K.'s perspicuous observations on Plotinus’ account of the nature of the soul, the composition of various faculties and activities within our psychic life, the causal role of the stars, the nature and contribution of the intelligible realm, his understanding of beauty and aesthetics, and many other topics have given Plotinian scholars much to digest for many years to come.

In addition to philosophical analysis, K. also provides what amounts to a substantial revision and commentary on the received text of Plotinus’ Enneads, offering original and insightful proposals and emendations, or providing usually convincing arguments against proposals that have been offered by recent generations of Plotinus’ readers. K.'s efforts to translate the Enneads into modern Greek has given him the basis for a close knowledge of Plotinus’ text that few alive today can match. Many emendations are quite sensible and will likely be largely adopted by specialists, however, some proposals are not fully convincing. For instance, the deletions of ἤδη at 1.5.2.13 or δὲ βλέπει at 2.9.9.68 do not seem necessary, nor does the deletion of ἑκάστης τῆς ψυχῆς at 3.5.4.7 along with subsequent modification of the following line. Despite these small criticisms, however, K. has given much for future readers of Plotinus’ text to consider and discuss.

A final note in praise for the translators of the present volume, Nicholas Pilavachi and Elizabeth Key Fowden. K. in their translation speaks with a single, unified and vigorous voice throughout. One hopes future volumes in this series will maintain the remarkable amount of consistency they have obtained in rendering K.'s modern Greek into English. All students of late-antique thought will profit from their labours and from this book.