King Leonidas, By Xeones Tell The Spartans
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Go tell the Spartans
Stranger passing by,
That here obedient to their laws …….we lie.
Thus reads an ancient stone at Thermopylae in northern Greece, the site of one of the world's greatest battles for freedom.
The book is told in a circuitous way; I found the jumping back and forth in time a bit distracting, but more off-putting was the way Xeones forecasts an event or subplot before narrating it in detail later. Already knowing how Thermopylae turned out, I was hoping for some suspense in the details, but there too Pressfield tells us the end before getting started on the story
In King Leonidas, Pressfield describes a king who feels it his duty to serve his people rather than being served. Leonidas is the pivotal Spartan, at a pivotal …show more content…
One part he leaves behind. That part which takes delight in his children, which lifts his voice in the chorus, which clasps his wife to him in the sweet darkness of their bed.”
It also includes very strong portrayals of women as secondary characters, the strongest depictions of women I've met in fiction for a while. The women don't fight in the battles, yet are courageous and compassionate, intelligent and influential.
One of my favourite speeches in the book is addressed to Xerxes, the King of Persia, and contrasts Xerxes with Leonidas: "I will tell His Majesty what a king is. A king does not abide within his tent while his men bleed and die upon the field. A king does not dine while his men go hungry, nor sleep when they stand at watch upon the wall. A king does not command his men's loyalty through fear nor purchase it with gold; he earns their love by the sweat of his back and the pains he endures for their
Go tell the Spartans
Stranger passing by,
That here obedient to their laws …….we lie.
Thus reads an ancient stone at Thermopylae in northern Greece, the site of one of the world's greatest battles for freedom.
The book is told in a circuitous way; I found the jumping back and forth in time a bit distracting, but more off-putting was the way Xeones forecasts an event or subplot before narrating it in detail later. Already knowing how Thermopylae turned out, I was hoping for some suspense in the details, but there too Pressfield tells us the end before getting started on the story
In King Leonidas, Pressfield describes a king who feels it his duty to serve his people rather than being served. Leonidas is the pivotal Spartan, at a pivotal …show more content…
One part he leaves behind. That part which takes delight in his children, which lifts his voice in the chorus, which clasps his wife to him in the sweet darkness of their bed.”
It also includes very strong portrayals of women as secondary characters, the strongest depictions of women I've met in fiction for a while. The women don't fight in the battles, yet are courageous and compassionate, intelligent and influential.
One of my favourite speeches in the book is addressed to Xerxes, the King of Persia, and contrasts Xerxes with Leonidas: "I will tell His Majesty what a king is. A king does not abide within his tent while his men bleed and die upon the field. A king does not dine while his men go hungry, nor sleep when they stand at watch upon the wall. A king does not command his men's loyalty through fear nor purchase it with gold; he earns their love by the sweat of his back and the pains he endures for their