Customer Reviews:
 Another excellent entry in the Hinges of History series by Cahill August 23, 2007
3 out of 3 found this review helpful
Thomas Cahill is doing a great service in making the basic tenets of Western European history available, readable and enjoyable. After a few decades of trying so hard to right the wrongs of centuries and thereby turning the pendulum so far back, the study of history would seem to start and end with ANYTHING BUT "dead white males" which does a disservice to everybody. Cahill would remind us of the highlights of the shared cultural history for all of us who live in the Western world, no matter where our ancestors came from.
Picking apart, as some reviewers have done, that he doesn't delve into this or that major battle or expound on the importance of the trireme...that is exactly the type of dry academic history that drives off the reader who is wants a book to be interesting and to learn something new, not to pass a test. At this Cahill is excellent. I could quibble too, having my favorite time periods or persons skimmed over, but the idea is for these 5 books, the "Hinges of History" series (How the Irish Saved Civilization, The Gifts of the Jews, The Desire of the Everlasting Hills, the Mysteries of the Middle Ages) to be light and quickly read. This book on the Greeks gives us a quick look at their civilization, its arts, plays, (Homer rates a chapter unto himself as it should be, and in fact made me want to go read the translation by Fogle he quotes from extensively)...their warfare, recreation, philosophy, finally, how they "ended", when their they were conquered first by Alexander the Great and then by Rome, and then even further culturally extinguished by their absorption into Christianity which changed the uniqueness of what they were forever, for better or worse.
The Greeks invented democracy, not so little a thing when you think about it, and utilized it, really actually utilized it, for a long time. Eventually their political sytem too devolved into tyranny, and then they were conquered by outsiders, but for a brief time in all of the long history of the past in all of the planet, there was a small city-state which came up with this unbelievable idea, and put it into action. That, alone, would make them, as a people, memorable. Yes, they had slaves, and treated women badly (no worse than most ancient cultures and many modern ones however.)
Their democracy--actually, speaking only of Athen's and it's colonies for about 200 years: "Athens the world's firsts attempt at a democracy---a Greek word meaning "rule by the people"---still stands out as the most wildly participatory government in history. Never again would such a broadly based...model be attempted. And...it worked."
(Sparta, on the other hand,was "ruled by...a council of old men, was an airless, artless,nightmare of xenophobic military preparedness, the North Korea of its day.")
The Athenians idealized beauty, invented philosophical discussion, took mathematics and medicine from the ancient Egyptians and in the case of mathematics, kept on and on with it, tying it to philosophy and turning it something no longer earthbound, no longer just for the building of monuments for dead kings.
A worthwhile book, one that would hopefully introduce some people to the Greeks, reintroduce others, and perhaps help rehabilitate them again into our cultural legacy where they belong. Without them, none of us would be as we are, and probably be the worse for it.
 Greek History "Lite" August 3, 2007
0 out of 4 found this review helpful
Actually I was enjoying the book most of the way through. Cahill writes well, without every drab detail that most history textbooks include. My disappointment started around chapter 7 "Greco-Roman Meets Judeo-Christian" where Cahill applauds separation of church and state. Worse, he takes it a step further and jumps on the Bush-bashing bandwagon, even specifically calling out Don Rumsfeld as an imperialist and criticizing the current administration for a "dismissive" approach to the UN. Perhaps the author hadn't noticed the UN is filled with dictators and deep corruption. Sorry Mr. Cahill, you just alienated half of your fan base.
Sailing the Wine Dark Sea July 7, 2007
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
When I was a boy I was given a book on classical Greece. A childs book, it celebrated the virtues of Greece and passed by some of the less-glamorous characteristics.
Mr. Cahill writes a fascinating a highly understandable book about the heritage that we, who think of ourselves as Westerners, owe to the Greeks of the classical age. I avoid the term "ancient" when I discuss the Greeks of this period, as even though they are seperated from us by 2,400 years, they are not only like us in many ways, they ARE us. Unlike earlier cultures, the contentious and divisive Greeks are our progenitors. Mr. Cahill has written an excellent narrative regarding the debt that western culture owes to the political, social, artistic, and cultural inventions of the Greeks, both good and bad, and he does so in a lively and very thoughtful way.
This is probably not a book which will provide new information to the serious scholar, however it will cause almost any reader to stop and reflect on our heritage, where it cam from, and how it evolved.
HARD TO LISTEN TO June 6, 2007
1 out of 2 found this review helpful
I find that with audio, if I am not happy at the end of the first cd, I move on to the next book... This is one of those. I learned little in the first cd, didnt learn anything about why the greeks mattered - maybe he is saving the interesting stuff for the last 4 cd,s.
Sailing the Wine Dark Sea:Why the Greeks Matter May 17, 2007
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Edith Hamilton is great--read her in high school eons ago. Cahill covers the territory from Homer on down for the lay person beautifully.
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