John D Harris

Lives & Opinions of Eminent Philosophers - Volume II John D Harris

Not what it seems. -Aristippus -American Puritan scion and white trash buddy up and meet Teddy Roosevelt and Joe Hill and Billy Strayhorn and Humphrey Bogart-Plato - anxious exhausted rock star meets Leery at Millbrook and LSD;-Polemon - the middle of life; what does a mirror facing a mirror mirror? -Aristotle - when reason is madness-Antisthenes-in the year 2176 the Perfect Society is hacked-Diogenes the Cynic-a homeless Cuban guides Richard Nixon, Elvis Presley and J Edgar Hoover to self-awareness -And stories of drowning, of sexual adventure, of an abandoned child and of discovery by heart attack****************************************************************Lives & Opinions of Eminent Philosophers (in three volumes) are compendium of fiction-short stories and novellas-that are predicated upon anecdotes and ideas concerning certain ancient Greek philosophers (with reference to several more modern ones). The title derives from original text of the ancient author Diogenes Laërtius from which I have taken some liberties. To each eponymous philosopher a certain similitude passes, sympathetic or ironic, and to each recast "hero" a given philosophy of some merit may be discerned, though not necessarily faithful to his namesake. In the end the purpose of the text is story telling, not philosophy, and unless you want truth in the matter of living, rather than dialectic, you may find this all disappointing. ********Volume I addresses: Thales, Solon, Periander, Epimenides, Anaximander, Chilon, Anaxagoras, and Socrates. . ********Volume II addresses: Aristippus, Plato, Polemon, Aristotle, Antisthenes, Diogenes the Cynic, Cleanthes, Pyrrho, an unnamed disciple of Epicurus and Chrysippus.. ********Volume III, unpublished and unfinished, is projected to include: Monimus, Crates, Hipparchia, Menedemos, Zeno, Pittacus, Pythagoras, Democritus, Epicurus, Heraclitus and Parmenides.