Access, etc.

Thucydides. On Justice, Power, and Human Nature: Selections from Thucydides’ History of the Peloponnesian War. Trans. Woodruff, Paul. Indianapolis: Hackett, 1993. Print.

Read pages:

46-50 (The Great Plague at Athens, 2.47-54)
66-76 (Mytilenean Debate, 3.37-51)
89-95 (stasis at Corcyra, 3.81.2-3.85, 4.47.3-4.48)
101-109 (Melian Dialogue, 5.84-116)
111-123, 155-160 (Sicilian Debate and related, 6.2-26)

Readings Journal Entries, In-Class Discussion Topics

Please comment on at least one of the following; alternatively, choose a topic of your own devising.

Leadership. Do we - and if so, where do we - see . . .
- charismatic leadership? (as per Weber)
- evidence for - or popular suspicion of - self-interested, counter-democratic activity, attitudes, etc. on the part of the rhetores and/or others? (Michels' "iron law")
- evidence for SUBSTANTIVE DEMOCRATIC DISCOURSE (as per Finley) at Athens or elsewhere
Cracks in the mass-elite social contract. Do we - and if so, where do we - see areas of persuasion as . . .
- impotent?
- being put to ill use?
What do you feel most needs exploration/clarification in the present set of readings?

General Issues, Themes

Thucydides in these pages seems to be exploring democratic persuasion in crisis at Athens. There is not much to cheer about here, but as in the case of Aristophanes' Knights, how are we to take these critiques?

As a cynically pessimistic rejection of democracy? (Is Thucydides a soul mate of the "Old Oligarch" in certain respects?)
As case studies in the pitfalls of democracy, perhaps with implicit remedies for whatever ails Athenian democracy? What is wrong with the patient, and can the patient be saved?

Informational

Who's Who?

Cleon (B.C. ?-422): Athenian politician and son of a rich tanner. Leader of the democracy in the period after Pericles' death to his (Cleon's) own death on a military expedition to Thrace). Aggressive proponent of the empire
Diodotus: Athenian politician, opponent of Cleon in the Mytilenian debate (nothing is known of this man apart from what we read in Thuc.)
Alcibiades (ca. 450-404): Wealthy aristocrat, flamboyant bon vivant, sportsman, statesman, general, orator. Co-commander of the Sicilian expedition until indicted for impiety (profanation of the mysteries; see timeline below)
Nicias (ca. 470-413): Athenian politician and general (and one of the slaves in Aristophanes' Knights). Moderate; opponent of the extreme imperialists like Cleon and Alcibiades. Commander of the Sicilian expedition

Timeline

431 war begins
430-426 plague (on and off) decimates the population of Attica
429 Pericles dies of plague
420s Cleon prostates tou demou (leader of the democracy)
428-427 revolt of Mytilene. Mytilenian debates (over whether to impose extreme punishment on Mytilene)
427-425 stasis at Corcyra
425 Cleon captures Spartans at Pylos (Cleon's "mission accomplished" moment)
424 Aristophanes' Knights
422 death of Cleon and Spartan Brasidas at Amphipolis
421 peace of Nicias (with Cleon and Brasidas gone, truce between Sparta and Athens possible)
418 Battle of Mantinea, War between Sparta and Athens renewed; Peace of Nicias is dead-letter
416 conquest of Melos (Melian debate). Sicilian debate at Athens (over Sicilian expedition). Debate at Syracuse (how to meet the Athenian threat)
415-413 Sicilian expedition
415 mutilation of herms, profanation of the mysteries. Indictment and recall of Alcibiades. Alcibiades defects to Sparta; Alcibiades' speech to the Spartans
413 Defeat of Athenians at Syracuse

Specific Foci

Great Plague at Athens

Not too long after the Pericles delivered the Funeral Oration of 430 BCE (after the first year of the war), a terrible plague (perhaps a disease similar to smallpox) decimated Athens.

The episode of the plague, and Thucydides' narrative of it, are of interest to us because of social and political resonances. On the one hand, the plague allows the historian to reflect on the "fragility of goodness" (as Martha Nussbaum calls it) when external pressures impose themselves on a political order. On the other hand, the narrative juxtaposed, as it is, right next to Pericles' praise of Athens in the Funeral Oration, seems to play a macabre counterpoint to the orator's idealistic speech, and to force us to contemplate the plague as a kind of metaphor for political dysfunction and stasis.

What commentary, then, if any does the plague narrative supply concerning Athenian society, politics, the war effort, etc.?

Mytilenean Debate

In this debate the Athenians are re-considering whether a punishment they've decided to inflict on a rebellious ally (on the city of Mytilene, on the island of Lesbos) — death to the men, enslavement of the women and children — is too harsh or not.

Cleon (yes, our Cleon, i.e., Paphlagon from Aristophanes' Knights), radical democrat and hawkish imperialist, is determined to make an example of the island rebels; Diodotus suggests, "Not so fast. . . ." So,

What are their arguments?
What issues come up that may have less to do with the matter at hand than with persuasion-based democracy or human nature?
Note the following, very interesting line, spoken by Diodotus: ". . . the most difficult opponents are those who also accuse one of putting on a rhetorical show for a bribe." Now, the Greek translated here by "a rhetorical show" is epideixis. What are we to understand as elements of such a "show"? What sort of bribe? How do we parse all this as anti-rhetorical rthetoric?

Stasis at Corcyra

Corcyra (an island-city off the coast of modern North West Greece) was originally a colony of Corinth, one of Athens' bitterest foes during the Peloponnesian War.

Allied to Athens, Corcyra found itself (a) at odds with its founding city, (b) embroiled in political turmoil (stasis) as pro-Athenian democrats battled anti-Athenian oligarchs.

The most famous part of the narrative is that having to do with stasis as a kind of Panhellenic (i.e., Greece-wide) plague, plus the destructive symptoms of this disease. So,

Is comparing the Athenian plague narrative with the stasis description a reasonable thing to do? How are they like/unlike?
Is the kind of spin-rhetoric (maybe the "rhetoric of stasis) described in the passage (pp. 90-93) something worth fighting against? Can we fight that kind of "fire" with fire, i.e., with words? Can we/can we not deploy against same an authentic and sincere anti-rhetoric? And related to that. . .
What does Thucydides mean by what is conventionally termed the "noble simplicity" ("simplicity, which is the chief cause of a generous spirit," p. 92)? (Yes, there's a footnote with citation, but what do you think it means?) Is this a simplicity that the historian would seem to want to fight for? That you would want to fight for?

Melian Dialogue

In 416 BCE, the Athenians, deeming it expedient to conquer the island of Melos (though they had no quarrel with Melos!), in this very interestingly staged dialogue (with speakers' parts etc.!), attempt to persuade the Melians that a novel kind of moral criterion, that of raw power and ambition, "justifies" the Athenian conquest of the island.

How is that similar to anything we've read in the sophists? In Plato's Gorgias? What would you say differently to the Athenians to help them see the Melians' point?

Sicilian Debate

In 421 BCE, after the death of Cleon, it finally looked as if peace with Sparta could be achieved, and it was: the Peace of Nicias (yes, our Nicias in Aristophanes' Knights). But it didn't last for long; soon, the combatants were at it again in 418.

In 416, an up-and-coming political personality, Alcibiades, nephew of Pericles, was agitating for a truly extraordinary conquest: that of the Sicilian city of Syracuse. It was thought by some that Alcibiades was aiming to establish a Panmediterranean empire.

Read the debate, Alcibiades versus Nicias, and think about the rhetoric of it, plus its dialogical aspects. Thucydides says that as a result of the debate, an "eros to sail (i.e., to Sicily to conquer Syracuse) fell on all alike." But what does he mean? How does this eros compare or contrast with that praised by Pericles in the famous Funeral Oration?

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