Why Classics Matters

The Cultural Relay: Pericles, JFK and why The Classics Matter

And then we ourselves, assembled here today, who are mostly in the prime of life, have, in most directions, added to the power of our empire and have organised our state in such a way that it is perfectly well able to look after itself both in peace and in war.

For Pericles self-sacrifice was, perhaps, the noblest of pursuits. An Athenian does not feel badly for the parents of a fallen solider, he says, for the soldier's was the greatest fortune—to die for the noble ideals of the Athenian state.

Pericles' Funeral Oration is a magnificent creation. Whether we credit it to the man himself, or to the brilliance of the historian Thucydides, the oration stands, along with many other literary creations of that golden century, as perhaps the most unmovable of monuments to the greatness of the first democracy.

Upon revisiting Pericles' oration today, I was struck by the ease with which I identified with many of his most important notions. This is a discourse of state that we of the twenty-first century are familiar with. Twenty minutes on google, and several interesting digressions later, I came upon John F. Kennedy's inaugural address …

... the torch has been passed to a new generation—born this century, tempered by war, disciplined by a hard and bitter peace, proud of our ancient heritage … Let every nation know that we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe, to assure the survival and the success of liberty.

The torch has been passed, indeed. For JFK, as it was for Pericles 2,500 years before, it is self-sacrifice that is the mark of a good citizen and the mortar of a good state; Kennedy is, after all, imploring his fellow Americans to “ask not what your country can do for you; ask what you can do for your country.” Such parallels must have us wondering, have we travelled so very far?

The dangers here are well known. In many ways it is our differences that define us. One can't help, for example, but feel a twinge of trepidation, when we turn to the Funeral Orations' finale: “perhaps I should say a word or two on the duties of women”; if the reduction of women to the status of an after-thought is disagreeable, what follows is down-right objectionable: “the greatest glory of a woman is to be least talked about by men”.

However this may be, we must acknowledge our debt to the ancients. Even if we wish to reject the torch metaphor—the dark ages were, after all, one leg of that relay—and argue, for instance, that no two ages can or do have anything in common, we must still be struck by the synergy between Pericles and Kennedy.

Of course, Pericles didn't invent the notion of self-sacrifice any more than Kennedy did. And Kennedy just as likely picked it up from any of a number of sources. But even if Kennedy had never read the oration, what are the chances that every one of the thinkers, writers and leaders that were his formative influences had missed it?

All of this should not be seen as an attempt to push the connection too far. Rather, the aim here is to point out that we have shared ideals, and that the creative and thoughtful minds of our times are continually connecting us to that lost age. The classical world is not a tail bone. It is a very real and functional part of who we are.

To this I would add that there are important lessons to be drawn from their experience. When Pericles died, Athens had just entered the war that would, in less than three decades, reduce them from a place of undisputed leadership to a position of subjugation. Pericles' Funeral Oration was, in fact, a swan song. The Athenians were soon to overstretch their capabilities in engaging in a disastrous naval campaign. While this may seem as far remote to, say, the war with Isis, or the Ebola outbreak, as can be imagined, we do well to remember that the Athenians were facing a battle-hardened and warrior people, and that it was the plague that killed Pericles. The interest, as well as the obvious limitations, of such parallels is clear.

Perhaps, in concluding, and in finally declaring my position, I can go back to Thucydides. In the opening to his histories Thucydides tentatively writes:

... if he who desires to have before his eyes a true picture of the events which have happened, and of the like events which may be expected to happen hereafter in the order of human things, shall pronounce what I have written to be useful, then I shall be satisfied.

At the very least, I can say that Thucydides should be satisfied; if to no one else, the Classics are useful—and important—to me.