by Cody Carlson<\/p>\n
The Deseret News<\/em><\/p>\n Review of\u00a0The End of Sparta<\/em>\u00a0by Victor Davis Hanson, Bloomsbury Press, 2011<\/strong><\/p>\n Having written extensively on the history of ancient Greece, it is no surprise that classics professor Victor Davis Hanson would set his first novel in that era.<\/p>\n His new book,\u00a0The End of Sparta<\/em>\u00a0is an intelligent and engaging work set in the mid-4th century BC, when Theben general Epaminondas leads his army of Boeotian hoplites against the power of the Spartan hegemony over Greece.<\/p>\n The story begins on the eve of the Battle of Leuctra in 371 BC. The leader of the Boeotians, Epaminondas has been preaching the ideas of the Pythagorean cult, which among other things holds that all men are created equal. This does not sit well with the Spartans, whose society depends upon the rigid control of their slave helots.<\/p>\n The Spartans are defeated and soon sent retreating back to the Peloponnesos, leaving the Boeotians with a major decision to make: Should they sit upon the laurels of their victory, and perhaps face another Spartan attack in a few years, or should they march south now, free the helots, and destroy Spartan power forever?<\/p>\n The principle character is Melon, a Boeotian farmer, who does his duty at the battle and loses a son, though covers himself in glory. In spite of himself, Melon becomes caught up the desire to march south and witness the end of Sparta.<\/p>\n Hanson’s considerable intellectual skills are on display throughout this work. The language he employs for his characters is exotic and clunky, just as it would have been spoken, though not without a hint of poetry. The complexities of politics and society are explored brilliantly here, without weighing down the narrative. The characters are by turns sympathetic and cruel, and entirely believable.<\/p>\n A critic of the Obama administration, Hanson also offers cautionary tales, as when the Athenians are presented as citizens of a city-state resting on the laurels of its former glory. The downfall of the great polis lay not in military defeat, Melon realizes, but in the democracy’s ancient entitlement programs.<\/p>\n Where Hanson really shines is in his description of hoplite warfare. Hanson describes the bloody Battle of Leuctra:<\/p>\n \u201cThe best hoplite was not the strongest right arm, Melon knew, but he who could cover his neighbor, stab, advance, keep his balance amid the flotsam at his feet, and hide in the shield cover from his right \u2014 all at once.\u201d<\/p>\n As can be expected from the subject matter,\u00a0The End of Sparta<\/em>\u00a0is a violent book about a violent world. The novel also addresses sexual themes of the day, though neither the violence nor the sex comes across as exploitative or gratuitous. Rather, Hanson presents these things as the Greeks understood them \u2014 simply a part of life.<\/p>\n Cody Carlson is a writer for\u00a0The Desert News<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" by Cody Carlson The Deseret News Review of\u00a0The End of Sparta\u00a0by Victor Davis Hanson, Bloomsbury Press, 2011<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[87],"tags":[598,106,1066,107,1028,534,306,533,478],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p466Sb-qz","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":1304,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/a-novel-vdh\/","url_meta":{"origin":1647,"position":0},"title":"A Novel VDH","author":"victorhanson","date":"December 23, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"Reliving the fall of Sparta: An interview. by Katheryn Jean Lopez National Review Online Victor Davis Hanson, known as VDH to his fans, has a new book out. This time, it\u2019s a novel,\u00a0The End of Sparta. He talked with\u00a0National Review Online\u2019s Kathryn Jean Lopez about the Greeks and the novel.\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Greece"","block_context":{"text":"Greece","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/the-world\/europe\/greece\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":2038,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/a-tale-and-taste-of-ancient-greece-the-end-of-sparts-reviewed\/","url_meta":{"origin":1647,"position":1},"title":"A Tale and Taste of Ancient Greece: The End of Sparts Reviewed","author":"victorhanson","date":"September 18, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"Editorial Publishers Weekly Leading classicist Hanson (The Father of Us All) focuses on the Theban defeat of the renowned Spartan army in 371 B.C.E. The hero of the tale is the Theban general Epaminondas, a devotee of Pythagoras and a warrior with unconventional attitudes about warfare, life, and death. His\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Reviews"","block_context":{"text":"Reviews","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/opinion\/reviews\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1437,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/the-end-of-sparta-an-excerpt\/","url_meta":{"origin":1647,"position":2},"title":"The End of Sparta: An Excerpt","author":"victorhanson","date":"November 20, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson As the Thebans help the freed helots build their new city of Messen\u00ea, the Argive general Epit\u00eales decides his men are no longer needed and will head home to Argos, leaving the Thebans and Messenians to their work: Epit\u00eales did not back down. \u201cI and my\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "History"","block_context":{"text":"History","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/history\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1651,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/the-end-of-sparta-an-excerpt-2\/","url_meta":{"origin":1647,"position":3},"title":"The End of Sparta: An Excerpt","author":"victorhanson","date":"November 6, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"Private Papers After the battle of Leuktra, and the defeat of Sparta, the Thebans parley with the Spartan general Lichas, who remains as defiant as ever: \u201cI\u00a0said hear your Lichas. You won a battle. A big one. But not this war. A bigger war \u2014\u00a0megas kindunos. That you will have\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Literature"","block_context":{"text":"Literature","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/literature\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":6534,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/the-end-of-sparta-a-review\/","url_meta":{"origin":1647,"position":4},"title":"“The End of Sparta” — A Review","author":"victorhanson","date":"September 23, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"A classicist's exemplary historical novel. by Albert Louis Zambone \/\/ BooksandCulture.com Classicists should infuriate other humanists, in the way that the handsome scholar-athlete who volunteers to help dyslexic children and is a genuinely nice guy should infuriate the guy who just made it onto the football team and has a\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Reviews"","block_context":{"text":"Reviews","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/opinion\/reviews\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1944,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/excerpts-the-end-of-sparta\/","url_meta":{"origin":1647,"position":5},"title":"Excerpts: The End of Sparta","author":"victorhanson","date":"October 16, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson PJ Media The End of Sparta\u00a0[2] comes out today. Now and then I will post excerpts from the novel. Today\u2019s is the Theban council before the battle of Leuktra. As the Thebans debate whether to meet the Spartans the next morning on the plain of Leuktra,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Literature"","block_context":{"text":"Literature","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/literature\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1647"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1647"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1647\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1648,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1647\/revisions\/1648"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1647"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1647"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1647"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}