This edition includes a select bibliography, a synopsis of each book, a glossary of terms, a glossary and index of names, and a general index. "Reeve's new translation of Republic is the one to order for students. . . . Reeve draws on his thorough understanding of Plato's central work to provide an informed translation and properly brief supporting apparatus. A highlight is the concise, substantive Introduction that usefully encapsulates much of Reeve's own scholarship." --P.W. Wakefield, in CHOICE
I'm wrapping up a semester of teaching this translation of Republic, and I've had few complaints. Waterfield's editorial hand is visible, but that in itself, in the hands of a competent teacher, leads to good discussions above and beyond Plato's ideas. With regards to Plato's masterwork, there's no good place to start save reading it for oneself. Plato is dead wrong in places (with regards to poetry and marriage just to get rolling), but his genius is that he's wrong as an idealist philosopher, encouraging readers to assert and refine their own ideals as counter-arguments. In other words, in order to refute Plato, one must out-Plato Plato. Deconstruction is fine for deconstructionists, but a good discussion of this juggernaut of ancient thought is the life for me.
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