Socrates: A Man for Our Times pdf

Paul Johnson travaille comme historien, journaliste et auteur. Il a fait ses études à la Stonyhurst School à Clitheroe, Lancashire et au Magdalen College, Oxford, et s'est fait connaître pour la première fois dans les années 1950 en tant que journaliste écrivant pour, puis éditant, le magazine New Statesman. Il a également écrit pour de grands journaux et magazines en Grande-Bretagne, aux États-Unis et en Europe. Paul Johnson a publié plus de 40 livres, dont Une histoire du christianisme (1979), Une histoire du peuple anglais (1987), Intellectuels (1988), The Birth of the Modern : World Society, 1815—1830 (1991), Modern Times : Une histoire du monde des années 1920 à l'an 2000 (1999), Une histoire du peuple américain (2000), Une histoire des Juifs (2001) et Art: A New History (2003) ainsi que des biographies d'Elizabeth I (1974), Napoléon (2002), George Washington (2005) et le pape Jean-Paul II (1982).

Socrates: A Man for Our Times pdf par Paul Johnson

A brilliant portrait of the Greek philosopher who personified philosophy. Socrates was undeniably one of the greatest thinkers of all time, yet he wrote nothing. Throughout his life, and indeed until his very last moment alive, Socrates fully embodied his philosophy in thought and deed. It is through the story of his life that we can fully grasp his powerful actions and ideas. In his highly acclaimed style, historian Paul Johnson masterfully disentangles centuries of scarce sources to offer a riveting account of a homely but charismatic middle-class man living in Athens in the fifth century b.c., and how what this man thought still shapes the way we decide how to act, and how we fathom the notion of body and soul. Johnson provides a compelling picture of the city and people Socrates reciprocally delighted in, as well as many enlightening and intimate analyses of specific aspects of his personality. Enchantingly portraying "the sheer power of Socrates's mind, and its unique combination of steel, subtlety, and frivolity," Paul Johnson captures the vast and intriguing life of a man who did nothing less than supply the basic apparatus of the human mind.