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Rating: 
Summary: The Liberator and the Conqueror
Review: Plutarch tends to be moralistic and tangential. Thucydides slows down his narrative with an abundance of detail and set speeches. If you want a good, straightforward "rumpty tumpty" presentation of exciting and dramatic historical events, then Diodorus is your man. He doesn't shy away either from describing violence and brutality when necessary. Although Plutarch's characterization and Thucydides's clarity are beyond compare, Diodorus's history can compete because its sweep is so much grander. This volume from the Loeb Classical Library, Greek on one page, English on the other, covers the period 345 BC to 323 BC. The volume starts with an account of the career of Timoleon, the great liberator of Sicily. Arriving in an island terrorized by tyrants and torn by constant warfare, he succeeded in driving out the tyrants, restoring democracy, uniting the Greek-speaking population, and defeating a massive Carthaginian invasion with a scratch army of mercenaries. The invincibility of Greek heavy infantry is presented here as a simple fact without according it any special religious or racial significance. This refusal to respond emotionally to the events he describes, events which involved his own native island, is both a strength and a weakness of Diodorus. He is more a trainspotter of historical facts than a propagandist of Greek civilization. The focus of the book soon switches to Greece and the final rise of Macedonian power leading to Alexander's invasion of Asia. This territory has perhaps been more ably covered by Arrian and, in parts, by Plutarch, nevertheless there is much here which other writers have missed, for example the description of Memnon's campaign in the Troad, an extremely interesting account of the siege and defense engines employed at Tyre, and an account of the origins of the Indian practice of suttee. After the main battles have been won and the great cities of the Persian Empire conquered, the narrative becomes a little tedious as we plough through Alexander's endless campaigns against central Asian hill tribes and Indian towns and villages. When the army finally refuses to go any further, the reader is in perfect agreement. It was at this point that Alexander commanded his troops to build a camp with everything in it doubled in size to give subsequent generations of Indians the impression that the Macedonians were giants instead of men. Alexander then returned to Babylon where his death was predicted and soon followed, a suitable end for this volume which starts with a liberator and ends with a conqueror. In the side margin of each page there is a date so that the chronology is always clear, and any omissions by Diodorus are effectively dealt with by excellent footnotes which cross reference with other historical sources.
Rating:
Summary: The Liberator and the Conqueror
Review: Plutarch tends to be moralistic and tangential. Thucydides slows down his narrative with an abundance of detail and set speeches. If you want a good, straightforward "rumpty tumpty" presentation of exciting and dramatic historical events, then Diodorus is your man. He doesn't shy away either from describing violence and brutality when necessary. Although Plutarch's characterization and Thucydides's clarity are beyond compare, Diodorus's history can compete because its sweep is so much grander. This volume from the Loeb Classical Library, Greek on one page, English on the other, covers the period 345 BC to 323 BC. The volume starts with an account of the career of Timoleon, the great liberator of Sicily. Arriving in an island terrorized by tyrants and torn by constant warfare, he succeeded in driving out the tyrants, restoring democracy, uniting the Greek-speaking population, and defeating a massive Carthaginian invasion with a scratch army of mercenaries. The invincibility of Greek heavy infantry is presented here as a simple fact without according it any special religious or racial significance. This refusal to respond emotionally to the events he describes, events which involved his own native island, is both a strength and a weakness of Diodorus. He is more a trainspotter of historical facts than a propagandist of Greek civilization. The focus of the book soon switches to Greece and the final rise of Macedonian power leading to Alexander's invasion of Asia. This territory has perhaps been more ably covered by Arrian and, in parts, by Plutarch, nevertheless there is much here which other writers have missed, for example the description of Memnon's campaign in the Troad, an extremely interesting account of the siege and defense engines employed at Tyre, and an account of the origins of the Indian practice of suttee. After the main battles have been won and the great cities of the Persian Empire conquered, the narrative becomes a little tedious as we plough through Alexander's endless campaigns against central Asian hill tribes and Indian towns and villages. When the army finally refuses to go any further, the reader is in perfect agreement. It was at this point that Alexander commanded his troops to build a camp with everything in it doubled in size to give subsequent generations of Indians the impression that the Macedonians were giants instead of men. Alexander then returned to Babylon where his death was predicted and soon followed, a suitable end for this volume which starts with a liberator and ends with a conqueror. In the side margin of each page there is a date so that the chronology is always clear, and any omissions by Diodorus are effectively dealt with by excellent footnotes which cross reference with other historical sources.
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