Forbes contributors publish independent expert analyses and insights. I write a weekly profile on the Great Books. Plutarch has an essay titled On the Malice of Herodotus, where he notes, among other ...
Plutarch's Lives of Illustrious Men translated from the Greek by John and William Langhorne, 1856 (this is the version quoted in the Parents' Review article below, which may indicate that it was one used by CM's students.) Plutarch's Lives beneficial in citizenship lessons - Parents Review article from 1901 AmblesideOnline Plutarch Readings:
Plutarch ends his comparison of Solon and Publicola with this: "For the King their enemy did not only make peace with them, but did also leave them all his furniture, provision, and munition for the wars; even for the virtue, manhood, and justice, which the great wisdom of this consul persuaded Porsena to believe to be, in all the other Romans."
(Plutarch's Life of Julius Caesar) Alexander the Great may be the best known, and the most romanticized, of Plutarch's biographical subjects. His story has been examined and debated for over two thousand years, by everyone from Oxford scholars to schoolchildren making stop-motion videos.
For older students: What is Plutarch's aim in writing the Life of Pericles? A hint: Plutarch criticizes certain things that "do not profit those which behold them, because they do not move affection in the hearts of the beholders to follow them, neither do stir up affection to resemble them, and much less to conform ourselves unto them."
Compare Plutarch's account of the discussion between Brutus and Cassius to Shakespeare's adaptation (Julius Caesar, Act 5, Scene 1) (see below). Is Shakespeare faithful to the spirit of the conversation as Plutarch tells it? How do you feel about the changes he has made? For older students: Brutus planned to kill himself if this battle were lost.