85 books like Socrates and the Socratic Philosophies

By Claudia Marsico (editor),

Here are 85 books that Socrates and the Socratic Philosophies fans have personally recommended if you like Socrates and the Socratic Philosophies. Shepherd is a community of 11,000+ authors and super readers sharing their favorite books with the world.

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Book cover of From the Socratics to the Socratic Schools: Classical Ethics, Metaphysics and Epistemology

Nicholas D. Smith Author Of Socrates on Self-Improvement: Knowledge, Virtue, and Happiness

From my list on Socrates as he is depicted by authors other than Plato.

Why am I passionate about this?

In Plato’s Sophist, the main speaker (not Socrates in this case!) mocks those he calls “late-learners," I fall decidedly into that category. When I first read the works of Plato, I was lured into a lifelong attempt to understand and explain the figure of Socrates as he appears in Plato’s dialogues. Lately I have been reading materials by ancient Socratic sources other than Plato and have been wrestling with the uneasy recognition that this “father of Western philosophy” was not seen in the same way even by those who knew him personally. Who was Socrates??? Once upon a time, I thought I knew…

Nicholas' book list on Socrates as he is depicted by authors other than Plato

Nicholas D. Smith Why did Nicholas love this book?

Most people who hear about Socrates are given a kind of stock portrait that comes straight out of Plato’s depictions in his dialogues. I really admire this book because it opens up new possibilities for readers to reconsider the Platonic portrait and reminded me to think about what it means for an important philosopher to be “remembered” by multiple people.

The book’s chapters include all of the important alternatives to Plato and Xenophon, usually considered the two “main” sources for Socrates.

By Ugo Zilioli (editor),

Why should I read it?

1 author picked From the Socratics to the Socratic Schools as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

In the two golden centuries that followed the death of Socrates, ancient philosophy underwent a tremendous transformation that culminated in the philosophical systematizations of Plato, Aristotle and the Hellenistic schools. Fundamental figures other than Plato were active after the death of Socrates; his immediate pupils, the Socratics, took over his legacy and developed it in a variety of ways. This rich philosophical territory has however been left largely underexplored in the scholarship.

This collection of eleven previously unpublished essays by leading scholars fills a gap in the literature, providing new insight into the ethics, metaphysics, and epistemology as developed by…


Book cover of Xenophon's Socratic Works

Nicholas D. Smith Author Of Socrates on Self-Improvement: Knowledge, Virtue, and Happiness

From my list on Socrates as he is depicted by authors other than Plato.

Why am I passionate about this?

In Plato’s Sophist, the main speaker (not Socrates in this case!) mocks those he calls “late-learners," I fall decidedly into that category. When I first read the works of Plato, I was lured into a lifelong attempt to understand and explain the figure of Socrates as he appears in Plato’s dialogues. Lately I have been reading materials by ancient Socratic sources other than Plato and have been wrestling with the uneasy recognition that this “father of Western philosophy” was not seen in the same way even by those who knew him personally. Who was Socrates??? Once upon a time, I thought I knew…

Nicholas' book list on Socrates as he is depicted by authors other than Plato

Nicholas D. Smith Why did Nicholas love this book?

It was exciting for me to read this book because the author is deeply committed to the view that Xenophon—and not Plato—is the most reliable and also most interesting source on the life and thought of Socrates. And what a different picture from Plato is given here!

Plato’s Socrates can be enigmatic, but Johnson’s review of the evidence in Xenophon gives a clear and robust portrait. But does this mean that Plato just lied?

By David M. Johnson,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Xenophon's Socratic Works as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Xenophon's Socratic Works demonstrates that Xenophon, a student of Socrates, military man, and man of letters, is an indispensable source for our understanding of the life and philosophy of Socrates.

David M. Johnson restores Xenophon's most ambitious Socratic work, the Memorabilia (Socratic Recollections), to its original literary context, enabling readers to experience it as Xenophon's original audience would have, rather than as a pale imitation of Platonic dialogue. He shows that the Memorabilia, together with Xenophon's Apology, provides us with our best evidence for the trial of Socrates, and a comprehensive and convincing refutation of the historical charges against Socrates.…


Book cover of The Circle of Socrates: Readings in the First-Generation Socratics

Nicholas D. Smith Author Of Socrates on Self-Improvement: Knowledge, Virtue, and Happiness

From my list on Socrates as he is depicted by authors other than Plato.

Why am I passionate about this?

In Plato’s Sophist, the main speaker (not Socrates in this case!) mocks those he calls “late-learners," I fall decidedly into that category. When I first read the works of Plato, I was lured into a lifelong attempt to understand and explain the figure of Socrates as he appears in Plato’s dialogues. Lately I have been reading materials by ancient Socratic sources other than Plato and have been wrestling with the uneasy recognition that this “father of Western philosophy” was not seen in the same way even by those who knew him personally. Who was Socrates??? Once upon a time, I thought I knew…

Nicholas' book list on Socrates as he is depicted by authors other than Plato

Nicholas D. Smith Why did Nicholas love this book?

Collected in this one book are very reliable and readable translations of a prudent selection of the fragments of Socratic authors other than Plato and Xenophon, and these are compared very intelligently to what may be found on similar topics in Plato and Xenophon.

Reading these gave me, as Platonically fixated as I am, a feeling of whiplash. Will the real Socrates please stand up?

By George Boys-Stones (translator), Christopher Rowe (translator),

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Circle of Socrates as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

In addition to works by Plato and Xenophon, we know of dozens of treatises and dialogues written by followers of Socrates that are now lost. The surviving evidence for these writings constitutes an invaluable resource for our understanding of Socrates and his philosophical legacy. The Circle of Socrates presents new--sometimes the first--English translations of a representative selection of this evidence, set alongside extracts from Plato and Xenophon. The texts are arranged according to theme, with concise introductions that provide an overview of the topics and the main lines of thought within them.

The aim is to give a fuller account…


Book cover of Memorabilia. Oeconomicus. Symposium. Apology

Nicholas D. Smith Author Of Socrates on Self-Improvement: Knowledge, Virtue, and Happiness

From my list on Socrates as he is depicted by authors other than Plato.

Why am I passionate about this?

In Plato’s Sophist, the main speaker (not Socrates in this case!) mocks those he calls “late-learners," I fall decidedly into that category. When I first read the works of Plato, I was lured into a lifelong attempt to understand and explain the figure of Socrates as he appears in Plato’s dialogues. Lately I have been reading materials by ancient Socratic sources other than Plato and have been wrestling with the uneasy recognition that this “father of Western philosophy” was not seen in the same way even by those who knew him personally. Who was Socrates??? Once upon a time, I thought I knew…

Nicholas' book list on Socrates as he is depicted by authors other than Plato

Nicholas D. Smith Why did Nicholas love this book?

This is it. If you want to see what the other most important Socratic writer has to say about Socrates, this book is required reading. The old translations of this (Loeb Library) have been wonderfully refreshed here by one of my favorite translators, Jeffrey Henderson.

What fun to read a new translation of Socrates chatting with the courtesan, Phryne, in the Memorabilia or doling out advice on domestic issues in the Oeconomicus. Yikes! Plato’s Socrates would never say such things!

By Xenophon, E. C. Marchant (translator), O. J. Todd (translator)

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Memorabilia. Oeconomicus. Symposium. Apology as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Socrates without Plato.

Xenophon (ca. 430 to ca. 354 BC), a member of a wealthy but politically quietist Athenian family and an admirer of Socrates, left Athens in 401 BC to serve as a mercenary commander for Cyrus the Younger of Persia, then joined the staff of King Agesilaus II of Sparta before settling in Elis and, in the aftermath of the battle of Leuctra in 371 BC, retiring to Corinth. His historical and biographical works, Socratic dialogues and reminiscences, and short treatises on hunting, horsemanship, economics, and the Spartan constitution are richly informative about his own life and times.…


Book cover of The Unknown Socrates

Armand D’Angour Author Of Socrates in Love

From my list on the life, death, and thoughts of Socrates.

Why am I passionate about this?

I have studied the ancient world for over 50 years and have found that there are always new things to discover. Everyone thought that all that was known about Socrates had already been said, so I was excited to discover new evidence for his relationship with Aspasia - a woman of extraordinary influence and intellect - hiding in plain sight. I am a Professor of Classics at Oxford University and Fellow and Tutor in Classics at Jesus College, Oxford

Armand's book list on the life, death, and thoughts of Socrates

Armand D’Angour Why did Armand love this book?

This book provides a series of translations of ancient texts relating to the life of Socrates, raising questions about his earlier trajectory among other things. The scattered sources gathered in this volume tell a very different story about the philosopher from that normally obtained by concentrating almost exclusively on his trial and death.

By R. Scott Smith, Bernhard Huss, William M. Calder , Stephen M. Trzaskoma , Marc Mastrangelo

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Unknown Socrates as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Socrates (469 399 B.C.) is one of history's most enigmatic and intriguing figures. He is often considered the father of Western philosophy, yet the four most famous accounts we have of him present a contradictory, confusing picture.

Just who was Socrates? Was he Plato's brilliant philosopher, at times confounding and infuriating, morally serious and yet ironic; the ever-worldly man, sometime mystic, and uncommon martyr? Or did Plato conflate Socrates' views with his own startling genius, as Aristotle suggests? Was Socrates instead the less impressive, more mundane man whose commonsense impressed the laconic Xenophon? Or could Socrates have been the charlatan,…


Book cover of Phaedrus

Peter Cave Author Of Humanism: A Beginner's Guide

From my list on grappling with what it is to be human.

Why am I passionate about this?

Who knows why, but I have always been enticed by absurdities, paradoxes, incongruities — I use them in my talks, articles, and books — of everyday lives, our humanity, and mysteries of our ‘going on.’ Reflections on being human can be triggered by humour such as Cambridge’s Beyond the Fringe and New York’s sitcom Seinfeld — within which I wallow — as well as by lengthy philosophical works and novels. My work draws on bafflements: for example, shampoo instructions “Lather, rinse, repeat” (making shampoo-ing infinite?); Barmaid to Peter Cook, “Bitter?”, reply being “Just tired”— and Samuel Beckett’s “I can’t go on. I’ll go on.” Yes, I go on.

Peter's book list on grappling with what it is to be human

Peter Cave Why did Peter love this book?

I frequently return to Plato and his portrayal of Socrates. The Phaedrus intrigues me. It is a difficult work for piecing together, yet with fascinating thoughts, taking us from rhetoric to erotic love to the search for Beauty, Truth, the Good.  What it is to be human continues to baffle me — not least because we often do have a sense of 'going beyond' the mystical. Yes — I do write as an atheist.  

By Plato,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Phaedrus as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Phaedrus is widely recognized as one of Plato's most profound and beautiful works. It takes the form of a dialogue between Socrates and Phaedrus and its ostensible subject is love, especially homoerotic love. This new translation is accompanied by an introduction, further reading, and full notes on the text and translation that discuss the structure of the dialogue and elucidate issues that might puzzle the modern reader.


Book cover of Theaetetus

Steven R. Perkins Author Of Latin for Dummies

From my list on the Greeks and Romans you never read in school.

Why am I passionate about this?

I like books to grab and hold my attention. That’s what I like about music, too, which is why I co-host a heavy metal podcast when I’m not teaching Latin or writing books and articles. Having taught Latin and Classics for over thirty years from middle school through undergrad, I know what people enjoy about the Greco-Roman world and what they often missed out on in school. I love reading this stuff, too, whether prepping for class, doing research for my next publication, or while listening to head-banging greats of the ‘70s and ‘80s, so dig in and get ready to rock with the Romans and groove with the Greeks!

Steven's book list on the Greeks and Romans you never read in school

Steven R. Perkins Why did Steven love this book?

When people think of the great rock bands, they think of the hits, the songs that raced to #1. True fans know that there are some great, even better songs, on the flip sides of the albums, the so-called deep cuts. The same is true with writers like Plato. Few are familiar with his Theaetetus, but it is my favorite. It explores how we know what we know and proves the error of a slogan that is as popular today as it was in his time, “Man is the measure of all things.” Plato shows how logically silly that is, and in a fairly humorous way…if you like philosophical wit, that is.

By Plato,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Theaetetus as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

— A Classic — Includes Active Table of Contents — Includes Religious Illustrations

SOME dialogues of Plato are of so various a character that their relation to the other dialogues cannot be determined with any degree of certainty. The Theaetetus, like the Parmenides, has points of similarity both with his earlier and his later writings. The perfection of style, the humour, the dramatic interest, the complexity of structure, the fertility of illustration, the shifting of the points of view, are characteristic of his best period of authorship. The vain search, the negative conclusion, the figure of the midwives, the constant…


Book cover of Plato's Symposium

Armand D’Angour Author Of Socrates in Love

From my list on the life, death, and thoughts of Socrates.

Why am I passionate about this?

I have studied the ancient world for over 50 years and have found that there are always new things to discover. Everyone thought that all that was known about Socrates had already been said, so I was excited to discover new evidence for his relationship with Aspasia - a woman of extraordinary influence and intellect - hiding in plain sight. I am a Professor of Classics at Oxford University and Fellow and Tutor in Classics at Jesus College, Oxford

Armand's book list on the life, death, and thoughts of Socrates

Armand D’Angour Why did Armand love this book?

Plato’s scintillating dialogue on the meaning of Love (as purveyed by a group of fifth-century Athenians including Socrates) is one of the key biographical texts about the philosopher. Allan Bloom provides an insightful essay on the central notion of the dialogue attributed to the ‘clever woman’ Diotima: the Ladder of Love.

By Plato, Allan Bloom, Seth Benardete

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Plato's Symposium as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Plato, Allan Bloom wrote, is "the most erotic of philosophers," and his Symposium is one of the greatest works on the nature of love ever written. This new edition brings together the English translation of the renowned Plato scholar and translator, Seth Benardete, with two illuminating commentaries on it: Benardete's "On Plato's Symposium" and Allan Bloom's provocative essay, "The Ladder of Love." In the Symposium, Plato recounts a drinking party following an evening meal, where the guests include the poet Aristophanes, the drunken Alcibiades, and, of course, the wise Socrates. The revelers give their views on the timeless topics of…


Book cover of The Allegory of the Cave

Erik Mortenson Author Of Ambiguous Borderlands: Shadow Imagery in Cold War American Culture

From my list on staring into the shadows.

Why am I passionate about this?

Who hasn’t caught themselves staring at a shadow? I certainly have. I have always found shadows fascinating. They are both there and not there, present and absent, and this in-between, fleeting nature keeps me staring. Shadows open a space for contemplation, and the list presented here traces a range of responses to the enigma they represent. Transitory images that exist on a fleeting border between light and darkness, shadows seem to invite me to make sense of their vague and shifting outlines, leading to both the joy of imagination as well as to that unsettling but pleasurable feeling of the uncanny as I struggle to fill in their outlines.

Erik's book list on staring into the shadows

Erik Mortenson Why did Erik love this book?

I have read this short section of Plato’s highly influential book, Republic, many times in many different settings over the course of my life and have always found it fresh and thought-provoking.

Are we just dupes staring at the secondhand shadows cast by figures on a wall, or will we escape our cave to find the truth in the light of the sun? Shadows have never been so denigrated! Nevertheless, I feel that Plato’s parable still has the power to make me question what it is I am doing with my life even if it was written over two thousand years ago.

By Plato, Benjamin Jowett (translator),

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Allegory of the Cave as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

The Allegory of the Cave, or Plato's Cave, was presented by the Greek philosopher Plato in his work Republic (514a–520a) to compare "the effect of education (παιδεία) and the lack of it on our nature". It is written as a dialogue between Plato's brother Glaucon and his mentor Socrates, narrated by the latter. The allegory is presented after the analogy of the sun (508b–509c) and the analogy of the divided line (509d–511e). All three are characterized in relation to dialectic at the end of Books VII and VIII (531d–534e). Plato has Socrates describe a group of people who have lived…


Book cover of Philosophy in the Tragic Age of the Greeks

Barry Sandywell Author Of Logological Investigations, Volume 1: Reflexivity and the Crisis of Western Reason

From my list on the beginnings of European theorizing.

Why am I passionate about this?

I'm currently an Honorary Fellow in Social Theory at the University of York, U.K. For more than five decades I've been working to promote more reflexive perspectives in philosophy, sociology, social theory, and sociological research. I've written and edited many books in the field of social theory with particular emphasis on questions of culture and on work in the field of visual culture. Recently these have included Interpreting Visual Culture (with Ian Heywood), The Handbook of Visual Culture, and an edited multi-volume textbook of international scholars to be published by Bloomsbury, The Bloomsbury Encyclopedia of Visual Culture. My own position can be found in my Dictionary of Visual Discourse: A Dialectical Lexicon of Terms.

Barry's book list on the beginnings of European theorizing

Barry Sandywell Why did Barry love this book?

This early study of the young Nietzsche is probably the most personal choice as it returns me to an earlier self who first encountered Nietzsche as an undergraduate in the 1960s. In one sense this was my first introduction to what later became known as `Continental Philosophy’. But more than this, it demonstrated that there were fundamental issues and problems that were simply evaded and occluded by the standard histories of philosophy and European culture. The passion to return to the ancient world as a way of understanding the modern world has remain with me to the present. Nietzsche’s reflections on tragedy and `the tragic age’ struck me as a vital source of radical questions and pointed toward problems that remain with me to the present day: the Indo-European language roots of the first thinkers, the seminal role of Homer and Homeric poetry within the problematics of thought, the rejection…

By Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche, Marianne Cowan (translator),

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Philosophy in the Tragic Age of the Greeks as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

For Nietzsche, the Age of Greek Tragedy was indeed a tragic age. He saw in it the rise and climax of values so dear to him that their subsequent drop into catastrophe (in the person of Socrates - Plato) was clearly foreshadowed as though these were events taking place in the theater. And so in this work, unpublished in his own day but written at the same time that his The Birth of Tragedy had so outraged the German professorate as to imperil his own academic career, his most deeply felt task was one of education. He wanted to present…


5 book lists we think you will like!

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