How to Say No: An Ancient Guide to the Art of Cynicism

by Diogenes and the Cynics, translated by Mark Usher

***🏆 A Five Books Book of the Year ***

This is a short and entertaining book about the ancient philosophy of the Cynics, presented and translated by Mark Usher, a professor of classics at the University of Vermont. After a short introduction, ancient Cynic texts appear in Latin or Greek on the left-hand pages, with English translations on the right. The Cynics didn’t write anything themselves, so the passages really attest to how others viewed Diogenes of Sinope (c 412-323 BCE) as well as other, lesser-known Cynics. The Cynics emerge from the texts almost as performance artists, doing often quite outrageous things in public to make philosophical points as well as living frugally and according to Nature (as they saw it).

Recommendations from our site

“This is a personal favorite. Diogenes was Plato’s contemporary, and a kind of performance artist. He lived a very frugal existence. He slept in a barrel—well, they say it was a barrel but it was actually probably an amphora—just outside Athens and had only a cloak as a possession. He originally had a wooden bowl to drink from as well but when he saw a boy drinking from a waterfall with his hands, he realized he didn’t need it and got rid of it. He famously masturbated and defecated in public and defied other conventions too.” Read more...

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