Pericles of Athens by Vincent Azoulay (review)

Pericles of Athens is Janet Lloyd’s fluid translation of the French original, Périclès: La démocratie athénienne à l’épreuve du grand homme (Paris, 2010), into the English language. In this book, Vincent Azoulay offers a sensitive and wide-ranging treatment of the scant evidence for the life of the Athenian statesman. Azoulay uses the biographical tradition to discuss not only Pericles but also the period in fifth-century Athenian history that has come to be associated with his name.

Azoulay begins with an overview of the political advantages Pericles enjoyed, both those he was born with, like family wealth, and those he acquired, like oratorical skill (chapters one to three). He then describes Athens in the fifth century, focusing on imperial policy and the economy, and probes the extent to which these spheres were “Periclean” (chapters four and five). Pericles’ political liabilities are considered, including reciprocal ties of philia, hierarchical ties of eros, and his relationship to state religion (chapters six to eight). Azoulay next tests the idea of an “Age of Pericles,” showing that the death of Pericles did not constitute a definitive historical break, and he outlines the extent to which Pericles as a politician was constrained by the Athenian democratic construct (chapters nine and ten). Finally, Azoulay enters into territory that will likely be less familiar to scholars in the field, and moves rather quickly through six hundred years of post-classical reception, documenting periods of obscurity, disrepute, and renown in Pericles’ nachleben (chapters eleven and twelve).

As Azoulay himself says at the beginning of his study, “A project centered on Pericles has to walk a tightrope” (4), and indeed this one does. Azoulay’s book offers a portrait of Pericles that is balanced almost to a fault. Azoulay scrupulously reveals both sides of every issue he examines — for example, the benefits and pitfalls of being politically connected, or that Pericles both was and was not responsible for the conception and execution of Athens’ imperial policies — to the point that it is difficult to draw any conclusions based on what is presented. Indeed, at times this book can feel formulaic. Most issues are discussed by first rejecting one unlikely extreme and then its opposite, only to arrive at the inevitable conclusion that the truth must lie somewhere in the middle but is, in most cases, impossible to specify.

While some readers will be frustrated by the conspicuous absence of definitive assertions, this approach does have its merits. The great virtue of this monograph is that it puts its reader in the same flexible frame of mind as its author, allowing multiple possibilities, however contradictory, to coexist mentally in a way that is more authentic and more “good to think with” than any definitive argument Azoulay might pen. A close reading of this book generates an idea of Pericles that is simultaneously faithful to the contradictory evidence and true to the ambivalent circumstances of the statesman’s life. Readers of this book will understand intuitively that Pericles’ advantages were also his weaknesses; that Pericles wielded almost unprecedented power over the Athenian demos and yet was utterly beholden to them; not only that what is now called the “Age of Pericles” should be linked to Pericles’ political career but also that the defining characteristics of this era in Athenian history existed decades before Pericles’ political ascent and lasted decades after his death.

As one would expect, Azoulay predominantly assesses Pericles’ ancient reputation relative to the opposing poles that Thucydides’ lavish praise and Plutarch’s blunt criticisms define, though he considers a wealth of additional ancient evidence to generate a nuanced picture of Pericles’ life. Azoulay is, as a rule, cautious in his use of ancient sources and keenly aware of the potential gaps and biases they may contain. Occasionally, however, he falls into the trap of speaking for Pericles; for example, he writes that, “[i]n reality, Pericles was above all determined not to be placed in the position of...