MASTER OF ARTS IN ANCIENT PHILOSOPHY

Happiness, Justice, and the Good in the Ancient Thinkers

 

READING LIST

 

Modules PH500, PH510, PH520, PH530

²     Irwin, Terence. ed. 1999. Classical Philosophy. Oxford: Oxford University Press. [An anthology of key primary source extracts with extensive commentary.]

 

Module PH515: Plato

[REQUIRED]

²     Brickhouse, Thomas C. and Nicholas D. Smith. 2002. The Trial and Execution of Socrates: Sources and Commentaries. New York: Oxford University Press. [Contains primary sources for Socrates, including Plato’s Apology, along with scholarly analysis from researchers in the area.]

²     Brickhouse, Thomas C. and Nicholas D. Smith. 2000. The Philosophy of Socrates. Boulder, CO: Westview.

[RECOMMENDED]

²     Brickhouse, Thomas C. and Nicholas D. Smith. 1989. Socrates on Trial. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.

²     Brickhouse, Thomas C. and Nicholas D. Smith. 1994. Plato’s Socrates. New York: Oxford University Press.

²     Irwin, Terence. 1995. Plato’s Ethics. New York: Oxford University Press.

²     Reeve, C. D. C. 1989. Socrates in the Apology: An essay on Plato’s Apology of Socrates. Indianapolis: Hackett.

—students may wish to acquire other editions of Plato’s dialogues and other modern commentaries.

 

Module PH518: Aristotle

[REQUIRED]

²     Irwin, Terence. 1999. Aristotle: Nichomachean Ethics. 2nd ed. Indianapolis: Hackett. [Translation with glossary and extensive notes.]

²     Urmson, J. O. 1988. Aristotle’s Ethics. Oxford: Basil Blackwell.

[RECOMMENDED]

²     Broadie, Sarah. 1991. Ethics with Aristotle. New York: Oxford University Press.

²     Hardie, W. F. R. 1980. Aristotle’s Ethical Theory. Oxford: Clarendon Press.

 

Module PH538: The Philosophy of Epicurus

[REQUIRED]

²     Inwood, Brad and L. P. Gerson. 1997. Hellenistic Philosophy: Introductory Readings. 2nd edition. Indianapolis: Hackett. [Contains Stoic as well as Epicurean primary sources.]

—for only the Epicurean sources included in the above title, see:

¨      Inwood, Brad and L. P. Gerson. 1994. The Epicurus Reader: Selected Writings and Testimonia. Indianapolis: Hackett.

—or for a different translation, see:

¨      O’Connor, Eugene Michael. 1993. The Essential Epicurus: Letters, Principal Doctrines, Vatican Sayings, and Fragments. Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books.

²     Sharples, R. W. 1996. Stoics, Epicureans, and Sceptics: An Introduction to Hellenistic Philosophy. London: Routledge.

[RECOMMENDED]

²     Long, A. A. 1986. Hellenistic Philosophy: Stoics, Epicureans, Sceptics. 2nd ed. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press.

²     Long, A. A. and D. N. Sedley. 1987. The Hellenistic Philosophers, Volume 1. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. [Readings from the main Hellenistic schools: Epicureanism, Stoicism, Scepticism, and the Academics. Includes commentaries on the readings. This is the standard primary source text. Volume 2 contains the original Greek and Latin.]

²     Mitsis, Phillip. 1988. Epicurus’ Ethical Theory: The Pleasures of Invulnerability. Ithaca: NY: Cornell University Press.

²     Reale, Giovanni. 1985. A History of Ancient Philosophy: 3. The Systems of the Hellenistic Age. ed. & trans. John R. Catan. Albany, NY: State University of New York Press. [See Part Two, on Epicureanism.]

²     Warren, James. 2002. Epicurus and Democritean Ethics: An Archaeology of Ataraxia. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

 

Module PH541: The Philosophy of the Stoic Epictetus

[REQUIRED]

²     White, Nicholas. 1983. Handbook of Epictetus. Indianapolis: Indianapolis: Hackett.

—alternatively, for a longer introduction, and commentaries on the Chapters, see my own translation of the Handbook:

¨      Seddon, Keith. 2005. Epictetus’ Handbook and the Tablet of Cebes. Abingdon: Routledge.

—some students may like to see the full corpus of Epictetus’ work in:

¨      Hard, Robin. 1995. The Discourses of Epictetus. ed. with introduction and notes by Christopher Gill. London: Everyman/Dent. [Includes the complete Discourses, The Handbook, and Fragments.]

¨      Oldfather, W. A. 1925/1928. Epictetus: The Discourses as Reported by Arrian, the Manual, and Fragments. 2 vols. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. [The Loeb parallel text edition, with English translation facing the original Greek.]

²     Sandbach, F. H. 1989. The Stoics. London: Duckworth, and Indianapolis: Hackett.

—or:

²     Sellars, John. 2006. Stoicism. Chesham: Acumen.

²     Sharples, R. W. 1996. Stoics, Epicureans, and Sceptics: An Introduction to Hellenistic Philosophy. London: Routledge.

[RECOMMENDED]

²     Dobbin, Robert. 1998. Epictetus: Discourses Book 1. Oxford: Clarendon. [Includes a very useful commentary.]

²     Inwood, Brad. ed. 2003. The Cambridge Companion to the Stoics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

²     Inwood, Brad and L. P. Gerson. 1997. Hellenistic Philosophy: Introductory Readings. 2nd edition. Indianapolis: Hackett. [Contains Epicurean as well as Stoic primary sources.]

²     Long, A. A. 1986. Hellenistic Philosophy: Stoics, Epicureans, Sceptics. 2nd ed. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press.

²     Long, A. A. and D. N. Sedley. 1987. The Hellenistic Philosophers, Volume 1. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. [Readings from the main Hellenistic schools: Epicureanism, Stoicism, Scepticism, and the Academics. Includes commentaries on the readings. This is the standard primary source text. Volume 2 contains the original Greek and Latin.]

²     Long, A. A. 2002. Epictetus: A Stoic and Socratic Guide to Life. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

²     Reale, Giovanni. 1990. A History of Ancient Philosophy: 4. The Schools of the Imperial Age. ed. & trans. John R. Catan. Albany, NY: State University of New York Press. [See Part One, Section Three, on the Roman Stoics, Seneca, Epictetus and Marcus Aurelius.]

²     Sellars, John. 2003. The Art of Living: The Stoics on the Nature and Function of Philosophy. Aldershot: Ashgate.

 

General Works Also Recommend

²     Algra, Keimpe, et al. eds. 1999. The Cambridge History of Hellenistic Philosophy. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. [Especially helpful for Modules G and H.]

²     Annas, Julia. 1992. Hellenistic Philosophy of Mind. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press.

²     Annas, Julia. 1995. The Morality of Happiness. New York: Oxford University Press.

²     Hadot, Pierre. 2002. What Is Ancient Philosophy? Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

²     Nussbaum, Martha C. 1994. The Therapy of Desire: Theory and Practice in Hellenistic Ethics. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.

²     Zeyl, Donald J. ed. 1997. Encyclopedia of Classical Philosophy. London: Fitzroy Dearborn.

 

Keith H. Seddon, Ph.D.

[email protected]

[2006-06-03]