Socrates is revered as a man who spoke truth to power. Yet his death in 399 BC was the first time in recorded history that a democratic government condemned a person to death for their beliefs. His death was a potent symbol of free speech, and Socrates' fate has haunted Western thought ever since - a guiding influence on Plato, John Stuart Mills, Nietzsche and Martin Luther King.In this incisive survey of philosophy and politics, renowned classicist and translator Emily Wilson unravels ancient philosophy's most enduring - and hardest - questions: why did ancient Athens execute its leading intellectual? How do democracies deal with dissent? And can our own society allow for total freedom of speech and thought?
