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iguessthisisme's review against another edition
4.0
It’s absurd for me to give a rating out of 5 stars to a seminal piece of recorded human history (and to the first real History book with a capital ‘H’) but this is a trying read, given the weight it gives prophecy and omens as causal forces. That’s natural given the state of human knowledge in Herodotus’ time, but makes for exhausting stretches for readers who aren’t historians and don’t have the context necessary to conjure a strong enough image of the time and place, or who aren’t personally fascinated with ancient mysticism and its role in ancient peoples’ understanding of the world.
dngoldman's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
funny
informative
inspiring
medium-paced
5.0
The Histories by Herodotus is one of Western culture's greatest works of literature. It is the first Western history book written in the way we think of the term. The book is also known for "inventing" ethnographic studies and presenting a dramatic tragedy worthy of Euripides. The Histories is also a meditation on power and different forms of government while urging the reader to think about relations between different cultures. While there is much on the darker side of human nature, the characters' drive, ingenuity, and loyalty make The Histories an inspiring work of the humanities. Although it is a long, ancient book, it is mainly accessible and entertaining while being informative and thought-provoking.
The book's reputation has risen and fallen over the millennia since Herodotus wrote The Histories. However, The Histories deserves its recent comeback. The book's wide lens and largely even-handed portrayal of many different countries, even those outside of the central conflict, its coverage of each country's cultural practices, and not just war strategy, are more current than the traditional "great men at war" histories that predominated the field after Thucydides.
Although including so many stories and countries outside of the main action can seem like digressions, they are part of Herodotus's larger project - enquiring into how different cultures, political systems, and ethical norms can work together. The non-didactic warning about the dangers of tyrants and internal division is undoubtedly relevant now.
Even if relevant to the larger project, the so-called digressions and colorful vignettes interrupt the narrative and make the book over 100 pages longer than Thucydides's The Peloponnesian War. Their inclusion can question the overall accuracy of the work. However, the overall impact of The Histories is forceful, and the history is still one of the most valuable guides available to the period the book covers.
I read the Landmark edition. The translation is clear and readable, while maps and notes integrated within the text (not stuck at the end/beginning) are helpful while reading, as are the detailed timelines and several appendixes with essays by different experts. The downside of this addition is that the version can be unwieldy at over 3.5 lbs with pages larger than most books. I lugged this around on my Hawian vacation and have the back spasms to prove it! The Penguin Classics Deluxe Edition, translated by Thom Holland (not to be confused with the Penguin Classic), also has an excellent modern translation and is more manageable to read. I can't vouch for other translations, but I avoid older ones.
anarcho_zymurgist's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
informative
slow-paced
3.5
While I hesitate to describe this as a "good" read, exactly, it can certainly be entertaining. In fact, if I could sit down and talk with anyone from the past, I think it would have to be Herodotus. Not that I think he would actually have much historical knowledge of value to share, just because I know it would lead to such incredible stories.
muhly22's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
informative
reflective
slow-paced
4.5
Of all editions of Herodotus, this is the one to read. The additions (maps, footnotes, appendices) make it far more readable, and far more enjoyable, than it would be to simply read the plain text.
generalheff's review against another edition
4.0
Herodotus of Halicarnassus is famous as the proto historian. His book, The Histories, is generally held to be the first attempt at writing history based on a process of evidence gathering.
This, at least, was the vision of the author I had when tackling Tom Holland’s extremely accessible translation of the text and it is clearly an important dimension to the work. Yet the real charm of this book was in what I wasn’t expecting: the lengthy asides, the direct engagement with the reader, the tolerance of religious explanations. For what could have been a musty, dreary 2,500-year-old book actually turned out to be an often riveting read, periodically weighed down by excessive detail.
“Speaking of oracles …”. What first grabbed my attention was Herodotus’ affable direct-to-reader style. Often this marks a digression. These are both a blessing and a curse. When brief, these enrich The Histories and endearingly pull the reader into Herodotus’ world.
At other times, the digressions mire the reader down in needless detail. Perhaps the worst instances of this are where Herodotus turns anthropologist and insists on describing in painstaking detail the characteristics, religions, diets of a particular people (Egyptians, Ethiopians, Libyans, Indians and so on). All of this is as accurate as you’d expect for something written in about 430BC. The geographical asides are, likewise, action-interruptingly dull.
This issue is very much concentrated at the beginning of the book, where we hear about the far histories of the Greek and Persian conflict. Once we arrive at Darius and Xerxes and their invasions, these asides, thankfully, largely disappear and we are left with Herodotus’ still personable, reader-directed style but without the baggage of these earlier chapters.
“The resulting clash was, in my judgement, the most terrible that has ever been fought between two rival barbarian peoples; and the tactics deployed, thanks to my researchers, are a matter, not of opinion, but of record”. Sentences like these are what Herodotus is best known for. He is often at pains to describe the efforts he went to, be it travelling to the far reaches of Egypt, or tracking down a particularly knowledgeable individual, to substantiate his claims.
What I find so interesting about these comments is not particularly the early attempts at ‘doing history’ – I’ll leave that to the academic historians. Rather, it is the window opened onto Herodotus’ world. You almost feel like you are there with the author as he voyages around Greece. I, for one, find this strangely exhilarating given how unlikely the availability of such an old book is and the world it describes impossible remoteness.
“If one absolutely must touch upon the dimension of the divine, then my own interpretation of the matter would be that the goddess refused entry to the men who had burned down the palace at Eleusis”. Herodotus is certainly not above allowing divine explanations for events, an aspect of his writing that took me by surprise. I was fascinated to see the curious mix of emerging evidential standards in Herodotus’ writing mixed with sudden allowances for godly intervention. It certainly made the book feel authentic and ‘of its time’; I can, similarly, see why Thucydides writing just a few years later considered Herodotus a credulous fool, even if I find it a delightful quirk, marking a curious midway point between Homer and later historians.
So much for my survey of the many sides of Herodotus. It is precisely the many facets of the author that drew me in and made me persevere. Yes, at times the book gets bogged down (occasionally excruciatingly so) in mindless detail. But if you can get through these, you will be rewarded: firstly with a revealing, over-the-shoulder look at the lives of the ancients; and secondly, through an increasingly gripping narrative of a titanic struggle between civilisations that emerges as the author breaks into stride in the latter sections of the book.
This, at least, was the vision of the author I had when tackling Tom Holland’s extremely accessible translation of the text and it is clearly an important dimension to the work. Yet the real charm of this book was in what I wasn’t expecting: the lengthy asides, the direct engagement with the reader, the tolerance of religious explanations. For what could have been a musty, dreary 2,500-year-old book actually turned out to be an often riveting read, periodically weighed down by excessive detail.
“Speaking of oracles …”. What first grabbed my attention was Herodotus’ affable direct-to-reader style. Often this marks a digression. These are both a blessing and a curse. When brief, these enrich The Histories and endearingly pull the reader into Herodotus’ world.
At other times, the digressions mire the reader down in needless detail. Perhaps the worst instances of this are where Herodotus turns anthropologist and insists on describing in painstaking detail the characteristics, religions, diets of a particular people (Egyptians, Ethiopians, Libyans, Indians and so on). All of this is as accurate as you’d expect for something written in about 430BC. The geographical asides are, likewise, action-interruptingly dull.
This issue is very much concentrated at the beginning of the book, where we hear about the far histories of the Greek and Persian conflict. Once we arrive at Darius and Xerxes and their invasions, these asides, thankfully, largely disappear and we are left with Herodotus’ still personable, reader-directed style but without the baggage of these earlier chapters.
“The resulting clash was, in my judgement, the most terrible that has ever been fought between two rival barbarian peoples; and the tactics deployed, thanks to my researchers, are a matter, not of opinion, but of record”. Sentences like these are what Herodotus is best known for. He is often at pains to describe the efforts he went to, be it travelling to the far reaches of Egypt, or tracking down a particularly knowledgeable individual, to substantiate his claims.
What I find so interesting about these comments is not particularly the early attempts at ‘doing history’ – I’ll leave that to the academic historians. Rather, it is the window opened onto Herodotus’ world. You almost feel like you are there with the author as he voyages around Greece. I, for one, find this strangely exhilarating given how unlikely the availability of such an old book is and the world it describes impossible remoteness.
“If one absolutely must touch upon the dimension of the divine, then my own interpretation of the matter would be that the goddess refused entry to the men who had burned down the palace at Eleusis”. Herodotus is certainly not above allowing divine explanations for events, an aspect of his writing that took me by surprise. I was fascinated to see the curious mix of emerging evidential standards in Herodotus’ writing mixed with sudden allowances for godly intervention. It certainly made the book feel authentic and ‘of its time’; I can, similarly, see why Thucydides writing just a few years later considered Herodotus a credulous fool, even if I find it a delightful quirk, marking a curious midway point between Homer and later historians.
So much for my survey of the many sides of Herodotus. It is precisely the many facets of the author that drew me in and made me persevere. Yes, at times the book gets bogged down (occasionally excruciatingly so) in mindless detail. But if you can get through these, you will be rewarded: firstly with a revealing, over-the-shoulder look at the lives of the ancients; and secondly, through an increasingly gripping narrative of a titanic struggle between civilisations that emerges as the author breaks into stride in the latter sections of the book.