Phocion the Good and Philippe P茅tain, Marshal of France: Parallel Lives?
Professor Peter Hunt
Thursday, April 20, 7:00听p.m.
Hale Science Building Room 230听& Zoom ()
Free and open to the public
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This lecture imagines how the Greek biographer Plutarch might write a Parallel Lives of an ancient and a modern stateman: Phocion the Good was a fourth-century Athenian statesman, who capped his long career under the democracy with a leading position in an oligarchy imposed by the Macedonians; Philippe P茅tain, the hero of Verdun in the first World War, collaborated with the Nazis after the defeat of France in the Second World War. 听Both Phocion and P茅tain ended their political lives on trial and then condemned by their own people. 听This thought experiment can help us better understand the structure, methods, and ethical goals of Plutarch鈥檚 Parallel Lives.
Peter Hunt听(Ph.D. Stanford 1994) a classical Greek historian, studies warfare and society, slavery, historiography and oratory. He is the author of three books: Slaves, Warfare and Ideology in the Greek Historians听(Cambridge 1998),听War, Peace, and Alliance in Demosthenes' Athens听(Cambridge 2010), and听Ancient Greek and Roman Slavery (Wiley Blackwell 2018). Among other current projects, he is beginning work on a commentary on Plutarch鈥檚听Phocion.