How to Have Willpower: An Ancient Guide to Not Giving In (Ancient Wisdom for Modern Readers)
Prudentius; Plutarch
ISBN 10: 0691220344 ISBN 13: 9780691220345
Published by Princeton University Press, 2025
Used
Hardcover
From
ZBK Books, Carlstadt, NJ, U.S.A.
Seller rating 5 out of 5 stars
AbeBooks Seller since 10 March 2023
This specific item is no longer available.
About this Item
Description:
Fast & Free Shipping â Very Good condition book with a firm cover and clean pages. Shows normal use and some light wear or limited notes markings. A solid, nice copy to enjoy. Seller Inventory # ZWV.0691220344.VG
Synopsis:
Lively new translations of two classical works that offer wise advice about how to resist temptation
How to Have Willpower brings together two profound ancient meditations on how to overcome pressures that encourage us to act against our own best interests―Plutarch’s essay On Dysopia or How to Resist Pressure and Prudentius’s poetic allegory Psychomachia or How to Slay Your Demons. Challenging the idea that humans are helpless victims of vice, these works―introduced and presented in vivid, accessible new prose translations by Michael Fontaine, with the original Latin and Greek texts on facing pages―emphasize the power of personal choice and the possibility of personal growth, as they offer insights and practical advice about resisting temptation.
In the spirit of the best ancient self-help writing, Plutarch, a pagan Greek philosopher and historian, offers a set of practical recommendations and steps we can take to resist pressure and to stop saying “yes” against our better judgment. And in a delightfully different work, Prudentius, a Latin Christian poet, dramatizes the necessity to actively fight temptation through the story of an epic battle within the human soul between fierce warrior women representing our virtues and vices.
Plutarch and Prudentius insist that we allow pressure or temptations to get the best of us. But they also agree that we can do something about it. And their wisdom can help.
About the Author: Michael Fontaine is professor of classics at Cornell University. His books include four other volumes in the Ancient Wisdom for Modern Readers series, How to Drink, How to Grieve, How to Tell a Joke, and How to Get Over a Breakup (all Princeton).
"About this title" may belong to another edition of this title.
Bibliographic Details
Title: How to Have Willpower: An Ancient Guide to ...
Publisher: Princeton University Press
Publication Date: 2025
Binding: Hardcover
Condition: very_good