Cynics. Ancient Philosophies, 3 (review)

William Desmond’s Cynicsis an introduction to Cynicism, its champions and their beliefs, and its place within the historical, political, intellectual, ethical, and religious contexts of antiquity and beyond. The Ancient Philosophiesseries has been “created especially for students … [and] offers a clear yet rigorous presentation of core ideas.” The volumes in the series are “designed to lay the foundation for a thorough understanding of their subjects,” and Desmond’s volume does just this.

The author takes ancient Cynicism “as a body of loosely related ideas that, as a whole, remained fairlyconsistent from Diogenes to Sallustius” (6). To provide a complete overview of Cynicism is a grand undertaking, yet the author’s purpose and scope in this volume are clear: “Here one can only select major names, quote some of their ideas or sayings, evoke the spirit of their times and sketch general lines of development” (6). Despite the variation of ideas, Desmond argues that there is an “overall continuity of theme” which he proceeds to trace from the Classical to the Roman Period (6). In the author’s own words (6),

although its fundamental ideas endured, they also took on many local variations, for as Cynicism was adapted by different personalities from different areas over a period of nine centuries, each observer selected and emphasized certain ideas over others, and so lent his own style to the underlying Cynic outlook. It is a challenge to recognize both the variety of ancient Cynicism, and the unity that underlies this multiplicity.

This volume is up to the challenge, however, as the author proceeds to navigate and “piece together a mad jigsaw of ancient fragments,” which provides an overall picture of Cynicism in context (8). The limitations of this book are reasonable and appropriate considering its nature as an introductory student text with such a broad scope. Nevertheless, given its limitations, the author still manages to provide detailed analysis throughout.

Desmond’s Introduction is followed by six chapters. The first chapter, “Ancient Cynics and their times,” introduces the reader to the movement’s important historical figures and their general ideas from the Classical, Hellenistic, and Roman Periods. Desmond’s discussion is interspersed with and illustrated by quotations from primary texts. This first 70 or so pages is historical in nature, yet it also establishes the ideological ground on which the following chapters build. The second part of the book (Chapters 2–5) is topical, engaging thematically with general tenets of Cynic philosophy. Chapter 2, “Renunciation of custom,” deals with the day-to-day life of the Cynic and his relation to cultural norms. Chapter 3, “A life according to nature,” attempts to set out (insofar as it is possible) the Cynic ontology according to which the Cynic conducts his or her life. The fourth chapter, “Chance, fate, fortune and the self,” lays out the Cynic’s understanding of one’s place in the cosmos. Chapter 5, “Anarchists, democrats, cosmopolitans, kings,” deals mainly with the Cynic’s relation to politics. Each of these chapters incorporates primary sources to illustrate the claims that the author makes and applies the particular historical figures to the given themes of the chapter. Because some of the material in Chapters 2–5 is introduced in the first chapter, the author’s method leads to the repetition of anecdotes and examples, as well as to the recurrence of particular phrases. Perhaps some more careful editing could have helped to tighten up these chapters. The last chapter of the book, entitled “Cynic legacies,” examines Cynic influences upon Christianity, the Renaissance and Enlightenment, and upon particular figures such as Rousseau and Nietzsche.

Each chapter is accompanied by endnotes providing further information, citations, and bibliographical information which make connections to other works and avenues of interpretation. Unfortunately, these notes get sparser in the later chapters. In a positive light, this might be the natural result of the corresponding decrease in length of the chapters as the text proceeds; in a more negative light, the lack of...