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Classics

Restoring the classics

by Christopher Allen
June 2013, no. 352

Confronting the Classics: Traditions, Adventures and Innovations by Mary Beard

Profile Books (Allen & Unwin), $49.99 hb, 320 pp, 9781781250488

ABR receives a commission on items purchased through this link. All ABR reviews are fully independent.

When Confucius was asked by his disciples how they should become wise, he would enjoin them to study the classics; over two millennia later and much closer to home, Winckelmann declared that it was only by imitating the supreme masterpieces of the Greeks that we too might one day become inimitable – putting his finger on the paradox that the greatest originality always has deep roots in the past.

 


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Confronting the Classics: Traditions, Adventures and Innovations by Mary Beard

Profile Books (Allen & Unwin), $49.99 hb, 320 pp, 9781781250488

ABR receives a commission on items purchased through this link. All ABR reviews are fully independent.


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