While Plato's Republic is surely one of the richest books in the history of philosophy, it is also one of the most written about, and therefore presents a formidable challenge: how to say anything new? Only a genuinely new 'take' on the dialogue will allow for a new vein of its richness to be tapped; David Roochnik has succeeded admirably ... Read morein doing just that.
Drew Hyland, Charles A. Dana Professor of Philosophy, Trinity College R. has offered a clearly articulated, carefully argued, and hermeneutically innovative reading of the most complex and difficult text in the Platonic corpus. The book is selective in its focus and rigorous in its development. It makes no attempt to exhaust the inexhaustible Republic, no attempt to solve all of the dilemmas raised by this text or by the voluminous literature on the dialogue. It picks its fights carefully and strategically, never losing itself in scholarly minutiae, always illuminating through its disagreements. It is ultimately a provocative book.
Colin A. Anderson, Hiram College
Bryn Mawr Classical Review
In this slim but elegantly written volume, Roochnik (philosophy, Boston Univ.) treats Plato's 'Republic' as a dialogue, which is to say that he is attentive to the fact that 'The Republic' develops and builds as a conversation might, with progressive revisions, qualifications, and attention to the method of the dialectic itself.... Roochnik's approach is persuasive and highly recommended to scholars of the classical world. Summing Up: Highly recommended.
Choice
Does Plato's Republic defend an authoritarian and monistic political system?... All of us (historians, political philosophers, classicists) who are rather ill-disposed toward the political implications in Plato's book should read David Roochnik's rebuttal of this standard view.... I can warmly recommend this book to utopian scholars who want to have a knowledgeable and insightful guide to the complex dialectical drama that is Plato's Republic.
Petteri Pietikainen, University of Hawaii
Utopian Studies
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