Cahill points out why some parts of history stand out. ( )

The ancient Greeks looked at the world as it was and thought, 'We can improve upon all of this. Just...all of it.'
Well, not really. But that's what they ended up doing. Whether it was in ways of warfare, poetry, politics or philosophy--even how we thought about being alive and our place in the world--they had their hands in it and minds on it. They wound up creating Western civilization.
Sailing the Wine Dark Sea follows the Greeks from the time when they were separate, warring tribes with very different personalities to the era of Greece's unlimited power, to its fall to Rome. It tracks the various movers and shakers of each movement through those times and makes them as real as if they were standing before you. (Pythagoras was a cult-having hippie and the politicians of the first democracy are as unscrupulous as the ones we know today. The more things change...)
Cahill provides translations of poetry and plays and speeches (some from Robert Fagles and some of his own) to illustrate the changing Greek mind over time. There are also images of sculpture, pottery and other types of artwork and architecture, showing the evolution of each of these throughout the golden age of Greece.
Entertaining and informative, Sailing the Wine Dark Sea is an excellent introduction to the history of ancient Greece and its contributions to Western civilization. At 352 pages it's not for the established Greek scholar, but it is a good overview and gives some idea of the scope of their influence. For those reasons I give it 5/5
[This is the fourth book of Thomas Cahill's Hinges of History series, which aim to bring to life the people and events of the turning points of civilization.] ( )

I've always been a fan of demotic erudition, and that's Cahill all over. Lots of fun, doubtless real historians might be given fits by some of Cahill's stretches, but heck . . . it's probably the most exercise they've had all day. A genuinely learned man's personal take on some things he's thought about a lot. ( )

V této knize, čtvrtém svazku autorova zkoumání „milníků historie“, Thomas Cahill doprovází čtenáře k dalšímu vystoupení – k cestě uměním a obdobím krveprolévání, které popisují téměř tři tisíce let starou řeckou kulturu. Již staletí před Zorbou bylo Řecko zemí, kde hudba, tanec a víno tekoucí proudem byly pro vysoký životní styl nepostradatelné. Cahill popisuje rovnoměrně duchovní i světské, a zaměřuje tak naši pozornost na odkaz starověku. ( )

A decent general introduction to Greek history and culture. It is populated with interesting insights and nifty stories that help elucidate the culture of the Greeks, how it evolved, and how modern Western society inherited it. The book suffers, though, from Cahill's every-now-and-then intruding opinions, which are generally of a leftist nature (for instance: boo George W. Bush [pp. 46, 250n], hooray John F. Kennedy [pp. 247-248]). It reads, sometimes, as a paean to hedonism. ( )