Plato

Christopher Rowe is Professor of Greek at Durham University. He has written commentaries on Hesiod (1978) and on four dialogues of Plato: Phaedrus (1986), Phaedo (1993), Statesman (1995) and Symposium (1998). He is joint editor (with Julia Annas) of Approaches to Plato, Modern and Ancient (2002), and has completed a translation of Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics to accompany a new commentary by Sarah Broadie (2002).

'This book can be highly recommended as one of the clearest and most concise introductions in English to the full range of Plato's dialogues and the ideas explored in them. While giving priority to a critical engagement with individual works, it also provides guidance on the historical context in which Plato's thinking developed' (Stephen Halliwell, University of St Andrews). 'Christopher Rowe's Plato, ahead of its time when first published [in 1984] is highly welcome in a new reprint. Rowe faces from the start the point that the reader of Plato's dialogues is encountering a challenging form of philosophy, one which demands both intellectual rigour and personal response, one which challenges the reader both to systematize the ideas in different dialogues and to do justice to them in their distinct dramatic settings. Rowe's Plato invites us to shared inquiry rather than deference to established positions, and this clear and subtle introduction will draw the beginner into fruitful engagement with Plato's many ideas' (Julia Annas, University of Arizona).