La Muse au long couteau. Critias, de la création littéraire au terrorisme d'état

A man of nowhere, a man of everywhere: such is the odd status which tradition has bestowed upon Critias, a poet, philosopher and political leader in Athens during the last sombre years of the 5th century BC. A sworn enemy of democracy during the civil war of 404-403 BC, he was the uncle of Plato – who paid him a certain tribute – and was well-acquainted with Socrates and Alcibiades. Of his profuse, wide-ranging writings, there remains almost nothing. What has survived quite stubbornly, however, is his sinister reputation as a bloodthirsty tyrant, the fact notwithstanding that it relies on the sole, questionable testimony of Xenophon’s Hellenica. 

The present volume, which is mainly the result of an interdisciplinary colloquium held in Bordeaux in 2009, combines philology, philosophy and history to better understand this (exceptionally) protean character.