![](\"http:\/\/images.barnesandnoble.com\/images\/26140000\/26142093.jpg\")
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The Anabasis of Cyrus<\/em><\/a> Translation by Wayne Ambler<\/a><\/strong>.<\/p>\n The long awaited Xenophon Roundtable<\/strong> <\/a>begins today at Chicago Boyz<\/strong> <\/a>with an introductory post by our host and moderator, Lexington Green,<\/strong> which I reproduce in full, followed by\u00a0a few\u00a0comments.<\/p>\n Xenophon Roundtable: List of Contributors<\/a><\/p>\n Our <\/strong>Xenophon Roundtable<\/strong><\/a> begins this week.<\/strong><\/p>\n Xenophon<\/strong><\/a>‘s Anabasis of Cyrus was written roughly 2,400 years ago. Yet it is still of interest and value today, for many reasons. It is an exciting tale of adventure. It is the first war memoir. It is a firsthand account of a military campaign that goes badly wrong, and of a man taking command and saving himself and his army from destruction. It is a travel book about exotic locales and natives. It depicts leadership under life and death circumstances. It contains remarkable examples of oratory and persuasion, where Xenophon had to convince because he could not compel. It is a portrait of conditions in the era following the victory of Sparta in the Peloponessian War. It is a comparison between the Greek way of political and military organization, and that of the Persians and other “barbarians”. <\/strong><\/p>\n There is a lot in this very old book. I and the other participants will be putting up several posts in the next three weeks about it. I look forward to what the others will have to say. <\/strong><\/p>\n Our distinguished roundtable participants are the following:<\/strong><\/p>\n Disraeli1867 is a graduate of the College and the Business School at the University of Chicago. He works in venture capital and equity research.<\/strong><\/p>\n “josephfouche” is a software engineer and system administrator slaving away for a technology startup somewhere in flyover country. He’s been reading military history since age nine and talking about it since his fourth grade teacher, asking a pro forma question, inquired if any student in the class knew anything about the Crimean War. (She got more than she bargained for.) He blogs at <\/strong>The Committee of Public Safety<\/strong><\/a>, a group blog dedicated to understanding the subtle interplay of human nature, culture, war, and power.<\/strong><\/p>\n Fringe is a University of Chicago Alum, and is employed as an academic. He has been a student of military history and military affairs since his childhood. He knows strategists, and understands the difference between a strategist and a student of strategy. He has published on many topics and in many venues, including articles about modern warfare.<\/strong><\/p>\n Lexington Green is a lawyer in Chicago. His common core humanities class freshman year at the University of Chicago was Greek Thought and Literature. It was the only A he got that year. Hblogs at <\/strong>ChicagoBoyz<\/strong><\/a>.<\/strong><\/p>\n HistoryGuy99 is a historian, and U.S. Army veteran of the war in Vietnam. After having a 30 year career in global logistics, he earned an advanced degree in history and began to teach. Currently he is an adjunct history professor with the University of Phoenix and Axia College. He blogs as historyguy99 and hosts <\/strong>HG’s World<\/strong><\/a>, a blog devoted to history, connectivity, and commentary. He is a co-author of soon to be published, Activist Women of the American West and contributing author to <\/strong>The John Boyd Roundtable<\/strong><\/a>.<\/strong><\/p>\n Steve Pressfield is the author of “Legend of Bagger Vance,” “Gates of Fire,” “The Afghan Campaign” and other historical fiction set in the Greco-Macedonian era-but nothing about Xenophon! Currently blogging about mil\/pol issues in Afghanistan on <\/strong>It’s the Tribes, Stupid<\/strong><\/a> <\/strong><\/p>\n Purpleslog is a Milwaukee-area blogger looking to enjoy and learn from an ancient true-life adventure story. He blogs at <\/strong>PurpleSlog<\/strong><\/a>.<\/strong><\/p>\n Mark Safranski was the editor of <\/strong>The John Boyd Roundtable: Debating Science, Strategy, and War<\/strong><\/a>, and a contribution author to <\/strong>Threats in the Age of Obama<\/strong><\/a>, both published by <\/strong>Nimble Books<\/strong><\/a>. Mark blogs at <\/strong>Zenpundit<\/strong><\/a>. Mark can also be found at several well-regarded group blogs including, <\/strong>ChicagoBoyz<\/strong><\/a>, <\/strong>Progressive Historians<\/strong><\/a> and at a U.K. academic site, <\/strong>The Complex Terrain Laboratory<\/strong><\/a>. Mark is a free-lance contributor to <\/strong>Pajamas Media<\/strong><\/a>.<\/strong><\/p>\n Seydlitz89 He is a former Marine Corps officer and US Army intelligence officer who served in a civilian capacity in Berlin during the last decade of the Cold War. He was involved as both an intelligence operations specialist and an operations officer in strategic overt humint collection. This experience sparked his serious interest in strategic theory. He is now involved in education. He participated in the Clausewitz Roundtable on ChicagoBoyz.<\/strong><\/p>\n Dr Helen Szamuely is a political researcher and writer. She edits the Conservative History Journal and writes its blog. She also blogs on <\/strong>EUReferendum<\/strong><\/a> and <\/strong>Your Freedom and Ours<\/strong><\/a>, as well as writing occasionally for Chicagoboyz<\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\n The list of contributors may not quite be complete as of this writing. Likewise, it is not unknown in previous roundtables for a\u00a0participant or two to get cold feet\u00a0once the first stellar post emerges. Two previous roundtables\u00a0were of a quality\u00a0where\u00a0a publisher decided that they merited being turned into books. I can say that I learned a great deal from everyone else\u00a0who decided to go “into the arena”.<\/p>\n By training my specialty is 20th century diplomatic and economic history, not classical antiquity. I do not have ancient Greek under my belt or a working knowledge of that subfield’s historiography. I have it on authority that Dr. Ambler produced a first rate translation, but I am incapable of evaluating his linguistic skill.\u00a0In recent years, I have taken to reading ancient history, classic texts\u00a0as well as secondary sources. This is not the same thing\u00a0as professional reading or evenreading the classics in the original languages,\u00a0but it is far more enjoyable a pastime\u00a0because\u00a0when I pick up a book I am learning something new –\u00a0as opposed to re-treading the same well-worn\u00a0ground from a slightly different angle or sifting it for minutia and minor errors. To an extent, I also can look at The Anabasis of Cyrus <\/em><\/strong>with “fresh eyes” because I am not well informed regarding\u00a0the controversies and implicit dogmas of\u00a0classicists and historians of antiquity.<\/p>\n Over the summer, I read The Anabasis of Cyrus<\/em><\/strong> and enjoyed it, though it\u00a0struck me as\u00a0different\u00a0from the first time, when I read a popular\u00a0translation entitled “The Persian Expedition”. Ambler’s Xenophon seemed to me to be far\u00a0more “present” to the reader, perhaps omnipresent,\u00a0and less a creature of a distant, disinterested, narrator. I took that to be to Ambler’s credit, reconstructing Xenophon’s voice\u00a0across the gap of\u00a0twenty four centuries.<\/p>\n The discussion will be good. I hope that the readers, some of whom know a great deal about the Greek world,\u00a0will join in the comment section at Chicago Boyz<\/strong>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The Anabasis of Cyrus\u00a0by Xenophon Translation by Wayne Ambler. The long awaited Xenophon Roundtable begins today at Chicago Boyz with an introductory post by our host and moderator, Lexington Green, which I reproduce in full, followed by\u00a0a few\u00a0comments. Xenophon Roundtable: List of Contributors Our Xenophon Roundtable begins this week. Xenophon‘s Anabasis of Cyrus was written […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[216,414,50,165,294,51,78,336,492,49,367,577],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3203","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-academia","category-ancient-history","category-chicago-boyz","category-historians","category-historiography","category-history","category-ideas","category-intellectuals","category-leadership","category-lexington-green","category-military-history","category-xenophon-roundtable"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3203","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3203"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3203\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3203"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3203"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3203"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![](\"http:\/\/www.assoc-amazon.com\/e\/ir?t=zenpundit-20&l=as2&o=1&a=0801489997\")