⋙ PDF Free The Golden Mean Annabel Lyon 9780307356208 Books

The Golden Mean Annabel Lyon 9780307356208 Books

Download As PDF : The Golden Mean Annabel Lyon 9780307356208 Books

The Golden Mean Annabel Lyon 9780307356208 Books

Canadian author Annabel Lyon's historical novel 'The Golden Mean' creates a deeply imagined image of Aristotle's life in the Macedonian capital of Pella, where he tutored the young Alexander. This is an intimate portrait of Aristotle as a kind man with the judgement to survive brutal court politics. Lyon's writing rings true to the times. In reading, I smell l the dust of ancient Macedon, the stink of the rot in its ancient markets & sewers, am blinded by the glare of its sun, my modern eyes shocked by the brutality of its slave marked. I see Aristotle differently than Lyon, as a penetrating analytical mind, taking on the project of understanding everything. Her portrait of Alexander is on target as an ambitious lion's cub. Close to Aristotle, but ferocious to outsiders. Lyon implies Alexander's role in the assassination of his father Philip, his odd relationship with his mother Olympias. It's hard for me to avoid seeing Alexander through modern eyes, he's so obviously bi-polar, in the extreme. In his mania, he thought he was a God, his father was Zeus, who fathered him through his mother (which justified his assassination of his father). This mania for deity became dominant later in life, when he forced his soldiers to worship him in Persia, offending their Greek customs. His mania was evident in his conquest eastward. I was once assigned to work in Tajikistan. You must go there to recognize the insanity of marching troops from Macedon that far. He marched his spear men over the passes in the high Hindu Kush in the winter, freezing many to death. (Hindu Kush means 'Hindu Killer'). And for what, to conquer a far-flung province of Persia with 5 villages, which harbored a fleeing Persian king? Insanity !!!!


Tags : The Golden Mean [Annabel Lyon] on Amazon.com. *FREE* shipping on qualifying offers. On the orders of his boyhood friend, now King Philip of Macedon, Aristotle postpones his dreams of succeeding Plato as leader of the Academy in Athens and reluctantly arrives in the Macedonian capital of Pella to tutor the king’s adolescent sons. An early illness has left one son with the intellect of a child; the other is destined for greatness but struggles between a keen mind that craves instruction and the pressures of a society that demands his prowess as a soldier.    Initially Aristotle hopes for a short stay in what he considers the brutal backwater of his childhood. But,Annabel Lyon,The Golden Mean,Random House Canada,0307356205,Historical - General,356 B.C.-323 B.C.,Alexander,,Aristotle,English Canadian Novel And Short Story,Fiction,Fiction General,Historical fiction,the Great,

The Golden Mean Annabel Lyon 9780307356208 Books Reviews

Aristotle. Philip of Macedonia. Alexander the Great. You've heard of these men, but what do you know about them? Not much? Well, that's okay; you don't need a prerequisite in ancient history to thoroughly enjoy Annabel Lyon's solid novel "The Golden Mean."

This is the tale of the philosopher Aristotle who is asked by his old friend King Philip to tutor his son Alexander and develop his mind as an intellectual in the same way that military training has developed him as a soldier. After all, every future king needs to be as wise as he is fearless.

How does one teach a young, head-strong heir to the throne in the ways of contemplative thought? This is one interesting aspect of Lyon's imagined tale, but it turns out not to be the most interesting one. No, of more interest is Aristotle himself his relationships with his family, his wife, his friends and the ancient world around him. Aristotle has his own problems, not the least of which is what we in the modern world would most likely describe as a bi-polar disorder. His moodiness colors his thoughts, his speech and the tone of the entire novel. Fortunately for the reader, this works.

Through Aristotle, we modern readers are able to see the world through primitive eyes. One in which house slaves are the norm, death is swift and common, and life is altogether more dramatic and challenging. And this is perhaps where the novel succeeds best. Lyon's word paintings of ancient Greece, like her dialogue, are sparse, economical and effective. I was amused by Aristotle's explanations for natural phenomena that are completely wrong but were the starting point for rational inquiry that would eventually lead to modern science.

Thankfully, Aristotle's relationship to Alexander is a complex one. They have great affection for one another, but are often at great odds. It's a classic tale of youthful exuberance chafing against the wisdom (and depleted energy) of age. Their honest and direct conversations surrounding their differences of view are some of the best bits of dialogue in the book.
In 343 BCE, King Philip II of Macedon engaged the philosopher Aristotle as tutor for his 13-year-old son Alexander. Philip, who was well on his way to taking control of the entire Greek peninsula, and had his eyes on the Persian Empire, had already taken care to have Alexander schooled in the arts of war. But wishing to temper the warrior passions with the influence of philosophy and the arts, he turned to the celebrated philosopher, a former playmate from his own boyhood. The three or four years that Aristotle spent with the young man is thus both a treatise on education and the story of the formation of Alexander the Great.

Mary Renault told this story from Alexander's point of view in her 1969 novel FIRE FROM HEAVEN. By looking at the relationship through Aristotle's eyes, Annabel Lyon downplays romantic and swashbuckling elements in favor of philosophy and psychology. Aristotle himself comes over as a fascinating character, interested not only in ideas but in every aspect of the world around him, studying the organs of his wife Pythias to better understand the physiology of desire, or dissecting the body of a warrior on the battlefield of Chaeronea to discover how the various parts connect. His appetite for knowledge is so modern in its empiricism that his occasional reversions to received opinion come as a shock. He greatly loves Pythias, for example, but it is only after her death that he has cause to question the old teaching that sexual pleasure is not accessible to women.

Alexander, by contrast, is drawn less in the accumulation of detail than in the gaps between his flashes of brilliance or bursts of petulance. Aristotle refuses to pander, but instead challenges the boy and earns his respect, building a relationship that also becomes one of mutual love. [Not a physical relationship, although Lyon is ambivalent about Alexander's sexuality and makes no bones about the frequency of male homosexuality in a society that made a point of sequestering its women.] Like a painter doing as much with shadow as with light, Lyon reveals Aristotle's character almost as well in his tutoring of Alexander's mentally handicapped half-brother Arrhidaeus as in his work with the Prince himself, and draws fascinating parallels between the philosopher's recurrent bipolar disorder and the post-traumatic stress syndrome that afflicts Alexander after battle.

Lyon writes clearly, sometimes beautifully, and the book is easy to read. All the same, it seemed to wash over me without significant focus. While I can certainly appreciate the concept of the Golden Mean between extremes as an educational philosophy, I cannot easily point to key moments in the book when that concept is put to the test. I also felt that the book read more as a footnote to a history and geography already known than as a story that could stand on its own. Although I once had a classical education, I had to read with a good historical atlas open on my lap, and even then could not follow all the geographical references; the offstage events also required a greater knowledge of history than I could bring to it, even with online resources. The novel provided a fascinating insight into the Greek mind, for sure -- but I am not convinced that it approached the philosophical or moral depth that David Malouf achieved at half the length with his recent masterpiece, RANSOM.
Canadian author Annabel Lyon's historical novel 'The Golden Mean' creates a deeply imagined image of Aristotle's life in the Macedonian capital of Pella, where he tutored the young Alexander. This is an intimate portrait of Aristotle as a kind man with the judgement to survive brutal court politics. Lyon's writing rings true to the times. In reading, I smell l the dust of ancient Macedon, the stink of the rot in its ancient markets & sewers, am blinded by the glare of its sun, my modern eyes shocked by the brutality of its slave marked. I see Aristotle differently than Lyon, as a penetrating analytical mind, taking on the project of understanding everything. Her portrait of Alexander is on target as an ambitious lion's cub. Close to Aristotle, but ferocious to outsiders. Lyon implies Alexander's role in the assassination of his father Philip, his odd relationship with his mother Olympias. It's hard for me to avoid seeing Alexander through modern eyes, he's so obviously bi-polar, in the extreme. In his mania, he thought he was a God, his father was Zeus, who fathered him through his mother (which justified his assassination of his father). This mania for deity became dominant later in life, when he forced his soldiers to worship him in Persia, offending their Greek customs. His mania was evident in his conquest eastward. I was once assigned to work in Tajikistan. You must go there to recognize the insanity of marching troops from Macedon that far. He marched his spear men over the passes in the high Hindu Kush in the winter, freezing many to death. (Hindu Kush means 'Hindu Killer'). And for what, to conquer a far-flung province of Persia with 5 villages, which harbored a fleeing Persian king? Insanity !!!!