Help with the "start with the greeks"

>>9039003
Im starting too and I am working thru platos republic

I reckon I just work thru his major works, read what some modern authors thought of him (bertrand russell) along with some aristotle and socrates (you get it thru plato) and do some of the other greek (e.g. milesians) etc. Then onto st aquinas

>>9039019
Funnily enough Plato's republic was my immediate first choice.

For anyone else who is reading this, I am interested in philosophy, not the mythology in the /swtg/ thread

>>9039031
Yeah it's interesting. I got the penguins classic one. Dont be intimated. Have you heard the phrase that so crazy only an intellectual would believe it. A similar thing applies to classics and philosophy. The book itself is rather straightforward. The book speaks on ethics, epistemology/metaphysics (broadly; philosophy) and politics.

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>>9039036
>>9039031
>>9039019
At the very least you should read The Iliad and The Odyssey, also secondary sources are almost as important as the primary ones. You can't just grind through The Republic and be finished, that's just consuming literature.

>>9039067
Thanks for this! Are there pdfs of these?

>>9039067
Myself personally much like the OP I am more concerned about philosophy than classics

>>9039098
Most of them are in the public domain

>>9039108
>Myself personally much like the OP I am more concerned about philosophy than classics
Greek literature reference The Iliad/The Odyssey almost constantly, (The reason being that they lived in the post-homeric era.) It's important to understand the cultural value of Homer to understand why he plays such a big part in everything ancient greek, permeating
both philosophy and fiction.

The Iliad is without a doubt the most important classic to read because it's still being referenced 3000 years later.

>Starting with the Greeks
My recommended guide step-by-step:
1) Pre-Homer: read "Mythologies" by Edith Hamilton (Apollodorus is just a meme by classic majors here) and read Hackett's "Anthology Of Classical Myth: Primary Sources in Translation" as a supplement to the proceeding myths
>2) Homer: read Iliad and Odyssey translations by Steven Lattimore. Read the Homeric Hymns and Hesiod's Telegony translations included in the Hackett anthology as-well as the Trojan epic cycle accounts and fragments (no need to get a book on Hesiod after this). then read the "Cambridge Companion to Homer"
>4.) Lyric poets: "Greek Lyric: An Anthology in Translation" by Hackett, which covers, summarizes, and gives commentary to the relevant fragments of the Lyric and elegant poets and the relevant odes of Pindar that relevant for reading later writers.
>5.) Greek History: read the Landmark editions of Herodotus and Thucydides.
>6.) Greek tragedy: there's no need to read all the extant plays of the three tragedians. For significant plays, I recommend you read the following Hackett's editions:
"Theban Plays" and "Philoctetes" by Sophocles; "Orestia" and "Prometheus Bound" by Aeschylus; "Medea, Hippolytus, Heracles, Bacchae" by Euripides, and "Odysseus at Troy" plays by Euripides and Sophocles.
>7.) Greek comedy: read the Complete plays of Aristophanes (publisher doesn't really matter)
>8.) back to Greek history: read Xenophon's Expedition of Cyrus (OWC edition) and Landmark's "Hellenica"
>9) Greek philosophy (pre-Socratics and Plato):
>Pre-socratics: Read Hackett's "Pre-Socratic Reader"
>Plato: Read the Hackett editions of "A Plato Reader", "Laches and Charmides", "Socrates and the Sophist", "Gorgias", "Theatetus", "Sophist", "Statesman", "Parmenides", "Timaeus" and "Philebus"; don't buy their Complete Works of Plato or any other full collections. Read Plato's 7th letter online.
>10) Back to Xenophon: Read his "Conversations of Socrates" edition by Penguin and "The Education of Cyrus" edition by Cornell University press
>11) Aristotle: Read Hackett's "Selections", then their editions of "Metaphysics" and "Nichomean Ethics"
>12) Orator speeches: read "Legal Speeches of Democratic Athens"
>13) Read Landmark edition of Arrian's "Campaign of Alexander"

copied from a smark greek geek anon

>>9039125
Also, you can just ignore the entire half of my post if you're just interested in Plato, but The Iliad is a must desu

>>9039125
Thank you matey. I want to start reading philosophy I will of course return to Homer and the other classic Greek writers in due time.

Also if you have red the Republic. How long did it take you to read, how do you read and adsorb it?

>>9039125
I just lump in The Republic with the rest of plato's work? Or do I complete the thirteen steps then read The Republic? Is that the completion of Greek literature?

>>9039128
>Also if you have red the Republic. How long did it take you to read, how do you read and adsorb it?
Took me roughly 2 months reading it on and off, I kept notes and usually wrote a summary after each chapter. The Republic is extremely enigmatic, as is Plato, don't be fooled by it's straightforwardness. Philosophers and academics have been studying Plato for half their lives and still can't fully understand him.

Even after having read The Republic I felt as if I had only touched the tip of the mountain, I bought a companion reader and took online courses to get a better grasp which helped a lot. Again, the reason why /lit/ is full of retards is because no one has ever touched a secondary source on anything which should only help emphasise how important it is to not just consume but also to study.

>>9039142
I red the introduction by Michelle Lane (as with most books people skim thru it but i thought for a book of this sorts you cant) and was astonished by the depth she approached it.

2 months you say. The book had me thinking and even laughing in the beginning regarding Cephalus. Where some guy attributes his success to his Athenian background.

>>9039141
The thirteen steps help give a solid foundation to understanding Plato and greek literature, but then again I'd say the only 'truly' necessary works would be The Iliad and The Odyssey.

Don't worry though, people who start with The Iliad usually find themselves fascinated by greek culture and literature and as such going through a reading list of greek essentials become something you do out of interest rather than a burden.

>>9039003
aristotle, ethics, politics, then metaphysics rhetoric

then you can read plato and dabble in the pre-socratics

aristotle is LITERALLY the best thing to come out ancient greece

>>9039354
Can't read Aristoteles without context m9