The audiobook of Lives of the Great Commanders is now available on Audible, Amazon, and iTunes.  This new, original translation of Cornelius Nepos’s Lives of the Great Commanders is the first to appear in nearly a century, and has been almost single-handedly responsible for renewing interest in this long-neglected classic.

Narrated by Saethon Williams, this audiobook is an engaging and stimulating experience.  The Roman writer Cornelius Nepos (circa 110 BC to 25 BC) was one of the first biographers in the Western tradition. His memorable and entertaining sketches of famous statesmen of ancient Greece, Persia, and Carthage shed light on classical concepts of virtue, character, and moral goodness, as well as the nature of statecraft and power.

Authored with a strong moral purpose, his book was studied in primary and secondary schools for centuries. Through him, we learn what character traits made his subjects great and what shortcomings led to their downfalls.  As reviewer Andrew Vittoria has written:

Nepos did not create the kind of overwhelming biography we so often see today, where every detail of a subject’s life is carefully cataloged for posterity. In this work, Nepos created a book designed to help the reader develop character and understand moral truths. This book could easily be used as a kind of “character devotional” for those interested in developing themselves. In fact, for several centuries Lives of the Great Commanders was used by schoolboys for a similar purpose.

This fresh, vigorous translation by Quintus Curtius is specifically designed for the general listener or student and introduces this great work to an entire new generation.

 

The book can be found here: