Republic (Oxford World's Classics)

Among all the translators of Plato's Republic who claim that their translations are intended to be readable, Robin Waterfield seems to be the only one to have truly fulfilled the pledge. His translation has demonstrated a simple belief that Plato meant for his Greek to be as readable and fluent as in an everyday conversation and that is exactly what Mr. Waterfield is doing with his modern English --- without assuming that there is a built-in difficulty in all the classic literatures. Because, he believes, "reading Plato should be easy; understanding Plato can be difficult." A rare combination of the knowledge of classic philosophy and the writing of children's fiction to his credit must have contributed to the admirable achievement of clarity and directness. In addition to readability, Waterfield has also made a unique contribution by abandoning the traditional "ten books" design (which was not made by Plato himself anyway) and regrouped them into "fourteen chapters" following the natural flow of the internal arguments in the texts. It is therefore only too logical for him to give each of his fourteen chapters a title and a brief introduction, not only for convenience but also to provide an overall scope of the book, which is in fact the longest and most complicated of all Plato's dialogues. Of course, he has no need to give up the standard means of reference to passages in Plato and the reader still feels quite at home with the conventional setting started as early as in 1578. To an avid reader, this new translation in Oxford World's Classics is an invaluable addition to his existing collection, large or small. One more point deserves our special admiration. While most translators think Republic is about justice in the sense of politics more or less, Waterfield alone chooses morality for the Greek word dikaiosone, which refers to something larger than justice and that "encompasses all the various virtues and is almost synonymous with virtue in general" (Aristotle Ethics). This intrinsic quality of justice does not, however, show up to give him support until in the last two Books (IX and X), or Chapters 12-14 in our case, where the issues of happiness, or unhappiness, and immortality of the soul are brought up. At this point Waterfield needs waste no time to prove that the book title Republic is rather inadequate, if not a misnomer, for being taken directly from the Greek word politeia, which means the public life of a community and has little or no apparent relationship to the idea of republicanism as we understand it today.

This was given to a friend as a gift. He was very pleased to receive it.

Excellent work in the Intro by the translator..., it preps the reader to best understand this complex work of classical philosophy.

An interesting read. Should be a required text for high schools, and written analyses of the book should be required for candidates who want to hold political office.

I own a different paper copy that I find to be a much better translation than this one. Perhaps it's because it was the first translation I read of this classic book. The language used in this book is not the stoic language you migh expect, whether that's good or not is up to the individual.

Kids love it easy to use and pictures for them to wanna keep on looks mh up new words and meanings

The introduction and translation to this classic by Robin Waterfield is absolutely essential for a full understanding of this philosophy.

Although some comments are positive, I reject this translator's' decision to translate dikaois as "morality" instead of "justice" as every other translation gives it. The English word "morality" conveys shades of meaning foreign to Plato's argument; and using this new translation also makes it difficult to enter into dialogue with earlier interpretations who assume the translation "justice." It seems equally perverse to reject the traditional division into ten books and instead use fourteen "chapters" -- each one given a title! This is seriously distracting -- and again, makes it hard to enter into dialogue with anyone using another translation. I'd suggest using Tom Griffith's Cambridge translation instead.

If you want to know what the future holds read about your history,

The Oxford world classics or the Penguin classics series are both the best options if you want to read a famous classic for the excellent print, sourcing of definitive translations and excellent supplementary material. While the Penguin classics are geared towards a more causal/average reader, the oxford editions tend to come with more scholarly features like their appendices, chronologies, and translator notes, etc, and as such, is a superior choice for reading philosophical works.On the translation it self, Robin waterfield has done a great job of preserving the simplicity of the original greek text without losing any profundity. The translator notes act as a great guide for cutting through the biases of Plato and gives a more neutral understanding of the concepts. Since the original work is filled with references of that time, the book back notes provide you with the context required to fully grasp the text and the implicit meanings.tl;dr: This is the best edition to get if you are interested in reading Republic as a common reader.

The media could not be loaded. An essential book.

Plato's text is easy to read, but difficult to understand, which is why this edition is so good. I have a hard copy and Kindle version of Waterfield's translation which was also used by Simon Blackburn in his own book on the Republic.Here's my take on the book after multiple readings of this and other translations.There are two ideas of the 'good' at play in the Republic.Firstly, the idea of the 'good' as doing the right thing; what we call ethics or justice, this is the traditional idea of the Good presented by Glaucon in the Republic. Plato shows this to be inadequate at the beginning of the dialogue. The other, is the idea of the 'good' as something constituted, in such a way, that it can fulfil a particular purpose; this something, might be a household implement, an individual human being, or a community of human beings. The function of a knife is to cut, while the function of human beings, is to live and prosper. In order to cut, the knife must be sharp, and easily handled; in order to live and prosper, human beings must be healthy, and well provided for. Plato goes on to show, that this idea on its own, is also inadequate, and that the two types of 'good' are integral to something, much broader and deeper, than just ethics or function. This broader and deeper conception of the Good is Plato's imaginative project in the Republic; but before he can present his ideas, he looks to understand, how human beings are constituted, and how ethics or justice, have been formulated, to facilitate life and prosperity.Justice is the 'business of everyone performing their task ... the principle that each single individual is to perform his own task without troubling himself about the tasks of others'. Morality is how we treat others; if we respect the fact that each person has a different task to perform, we will also respect, the resources they have at their disposal, in order to complete these tasks. How are human beings constituted? According to Plato, the mind or soul, is made up of three faculties forming a pyramid structure, with rationality at the apex, a passionate nature forming the middle, and a desiring appetite the base. 'The desirous part, is the major constituent of an individual's mind and is naturally insatiably greedy for things', 'the rational part is wise and looks out for the whole of the mind', and should rule, with the passionate part as its subordinate ally. 'The rational part will do the planning, and the passionate part the fighting'. Plato argues that communities reflect this tripartite structure of the human mind. When the human being or community is well-regulated it is able to sustain life and prosperity.In this way, morality is both ethical and functional. The most rational part of the human mind, and the most rational part of a community, must rule in order for mankind to fulfil its particular purpose. Plato's broader and deeper conception of the Good, draws on these ideas, but at the same time relegates, life and prosperity, to the status of a common concern. It is the task of the philosopher to move beyond these concerns and search for the ideal form of the Good.

One of my favourite philosophy books from Plato. Will never forget the cave.