David Bolotin

This volume presents the lecture notes from David Bolotin's celebrated 1988 University of Chicago seminar on Plato's Republic. A distinguished teacher, translator, and scholar, Bolotin offers a masterclass in teaching Plato. These course notes, revered by serious students of political philosophy, contain important insights into the Republic that ought to shape subsequent scholarship on the dialogue. They are published here for the first time in a definitive edition, accompanied by an introduction by the editors, Paul Diduch and Alex Priou, and a preface by Peter J. Hansen, a participant in the original seminar.

David Bolotin's translation of Aristotle's De Anima, or On Soul, aims above all at fidelity to the Greek. It treats Aristotle as a teacher regarding what soul really is, and hence it tries to convey the meaning--to the extent possible in English-of his every word. The translation itself is supplemented with footnotes, some of which, when taken together, sketch the outline of an overall interpretation of the work. Since Bolotin considers Aristotle to be a teacher, one who knows far more than we do about the matters he discusses, he has made a scrupulous effort to examine the manuscript tradition. And he has relied only on readings that are well-attested in the oldest manuscripts, rather than accepting conjectural emendations of modern editors, who all too often substitute a Greek text that is easy to understand for any of those that have come down to us from the ancient copyists. Bolotin's translation, though it aims at the greatest possible clarity in English, subordinates felicity of English expression to the demand for fidelity to the Greek. For readers-including those who may already know some Greek-who wish to study De Anima with care, it offers access that has hitherto been unavailable in English to the precise meaning of Aristotle's text.

Argues that Aristotle's writings about the natural world contain a rhetorical surface as well as a philosophic core and shows that Aristotle's genuine views have not been refuted by modern science and still deserve serious attention.Maintaining that Aristotle's writings about the natural world contain a rhetorical surface as well as a philosophic core, David Bolotin argues in this book that Aristotle never seriously intended many of his doctrines that have been demolished by modern science. To that end, he presents a number of "case studies" to show that Aristotle deliberately misrepresented his views about nature—a thought that was commonly shared by commentators on his work in late antiquity and the middle ages. Bolotin demonstrates that Aristotle's real views have not been refuted by modern science and still deserve our most serious attention.