Open AccessAlexander philosopher-king: from Philosophy to action
Author(s) -
Renan Marques Liparotti
Publication year - 2017
Publication title -
ploutarkhos
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
eISSN - 2832-2118
pISSN - 0258-655X
DOI - 10.14195/0258-655x_14_3
Subject(s) - macedonian , virtue , action (physics) , biography , philosophy , politics , portrait , literature , philosophy of life , epistemology , art history , art , law , political science , linguistics , physics , quantum mechanics
Plutarch, in his Life of Alexander and his speeches On the Fortune or Virtue of Alexander the Great, draws a portrait of a philosopher-king, inspired by Plato, Aristotle and Diogenes’ philosophies. This paper aims to analyse the dialogues between these philosophers and Alexander and to scrutinise the Macedonian’s political path whereby philosophical ideals were put in action. This study, therefore, may suggest that whilst in the encomiastic speeches Plutarch draws a king, enlightened by Philosophy, who made happier «all the inhabited earth», in the biography, contradictions of imposing a ‘blessed life’ are unveiled.