The Riddle of C.L.R. James, Classical Athens, and American Civilization

Many are troubled or have difficulty understanding the meanings of CLR James’s meditations on Classical Athens and his study of American civilization. Far more important than whether antiquity and modern societies consistently embody profound philosophical values is what are our own democratic aspirations. This is the riddle at the intersection of James Athenian meditation within his book American Civilization. Can Classical Athens be a measure for appraising America? Can the world of Aristotle, Aeschylus, Aristophanes, Cleon, and Pericles illuminate the ethnically and culturally plural United States? How does nuclear power compare with a few thousand Greeks battling in the Peloponnesian Wars, or at Marathon, Platea, and Salamis in the Greco-Persian Wars? As the 1950s began, C.L.R. James, a Caribbean radical scholar, thought this comparative thinking central for clarifying freedom and popular self-government. Perhaps sublimated within the American constitutional struggle for happiness was the class struggle. <a href="https://medium.com/@questphd/the-riddle-of-c-l-r-james-classical-athens-and-american-civilization-619e439f5cce">Read More</a>