The Essential Thucydides: On Justice, Power, and Human Nature (Second Edition)

Thucydides was the first ancient Greek historian to double as a social scientist. He set out to understand human events entirely in human terms, without recourse to myth. He sought to know why people go to war and how they are affected by its violence. He studied the civil war in Corcyra, which began when radicals burst into the council house and killed leaders who favored democracy.

The strengths and weaknesses of democracy are a major theme of his History. Its larger story shows how the Athenians tried to expand their empire too far and came to a crushing defeat. Here are vivid stories of land and sea battles, interspersed with fascinating and disturbing debates about war and policy.

All of Thucydides’s History is here, either in summary or translation, in a volume short enough for a wide readership. This Second Edition is expanded to include all the important debates and battle scenes, and the entire translation has been revised in accord with the latest scholarship.

The Essential Thucydides is the second edition of Paul Woodruff's On Justice, Power, and Human Nature: Selections from The History of the Peloponnesian War (first published by Hackett in 1993, paperback ISBN 978-0-87220-168-2, cloth ISBN 978-0-87220-169-9).

The second edition adds the following translated passages:

• Book 1. Corcyra Debate, 1.31-53, which sets the stage for the war and illustrates Thucydides’ way of framing a debate.

• Book 2. Opening of the war, 2.1-34. This is important for understanding Pericles’ strategy. Phormio’s naval battle, 2. 83-92—the most wonderful account of a sea battle; it shows up in a recent movie.

• Book 3. The Mytilene (Lesbos) rebellion, 3.1-16, along with 3.27, 28, 35. Crucial for an understanding of the Athenian empire.
• The decision to execute all the men of Mytilene, 3.36, which sets up the debate that follows.
• The Civil War starts in Corcyra, 3.70-81, which introduces Thucydides’ most famous discussion of values.

• Book 4. The speech of Hermocrates, 4.59-65, which bears on the way Thucydides’ characters understand human nature.
• The battle of Delium, 4.96—a major land battle vividly described, the first recorded case of killing by friendly fire.

• Book 5. The decision for peace 5.15-17. It is typical of Thucydides to attribute the peace to the self-interest of the leaders on both sides.

Reviews:

"At last—a good way to navigate the choppy waters of Thucydides’s account of the Great War! Woodruff has focused on themes of lasting importance—human nature, justice, and war itself. These have guided his skillful selection of passages and his deft explanatory comments, all in a fast-moving, readable style."
 —W. R. Connor, Andrew Fleming West Professor of Classics, Emeritus, Princeton University

"A fantastic edition and a notable improvement on the already solid earlier edition. The revised table of contents is more usable; the translation is, as always, readable and accurate. I will continue to use this edition for my intro courses in the years ahead."
—Luke M. Perez, Ph.D., School of Civic and Economic Thought, Arizona State University 

About the Author:

Paul Woodruff is Professor of Philosophy and Classics at The University of Texas at Austin. A veteran of the American War in Vietnam, he has also translated works by Plato, Sophocles, and Euripides and written about the ethics of war.