false 1305 20 <I>Go tell the Spartans, stranger passing by, that here obedient to their laws we lie.</I><p> Thus reads an ancient stone at Thermopylae in northern Greece, the site of one of the world's greatest battles for freedom. Here, in 480 B.C., on a narrow mountain pass above the crystalline Aegean, 300 Spartan knights and their allies faced the massive forces of Xerxes, King of Persia. From the start, there was no question but that the Spartans would perish. In <I>Gates of Fire</I>, however, Steven Pressfield makes their courageous defense--and eventual extinction--unbearably suspenseful.<p> In the tradition of Mary Renault, this historical novel unfolds in flashback. Xeo, the sole Spartan survivor of Thermopylae, has been captured by the Persians, and Xerxes himself presses his young captive to reveal how his tiny cohort kept more than 100,000 Persians at bay for a week. Xeo, however, begins at the beginning, when his childhood home in northern Greece was overrun and he escaped to Sparta. There he is drafted into the elite Spartan guard and rigorously schooled in the art of war--an education brutal enough to destroy half the students, but (oddly enough) not without humor: "The more miserable the conditions, the more convulsing the jokes became, or at least that's how it seems," Xeo recalls. His companions in arms are Alexandros, a gentle boy who turns out to be the most courageous of all, and Rooster, an angry, half-Messenian youth. <p> Pressfield's descriptions of war are breathtaking in their immediacy. They are also meticulously assembled out of physical detail and crisp, uncluttered metaphor: <blockquote> The forerank of the enemy collapsed immediately as the first shock hit it; the body-length shields seemed to implode rearward, their anchoring spikes rooted slinging from the earth like tent pins in a gale. The forerank archers were literally bowled off their feet, their wall-like shields caving in upon them like fortress redoubts under the assault of the ram.... The valor of the individual Medes was beyond question, but their light hacking blades were harmless as toys; against the massed wall of Spartan armor, they might as well have been defending themselves with reeds or fennel stalks. </blockquote> Alas, even this human barrier was bound to collapse, as we knew all along it would. "War is work, not mystery," Xeo laments. But Pressfield's epic seems to make the opposite argument: courage on this scale is not merely inspiring but ultimately mysterious. <I>--Marianne Painter</I> 1154187 1998 Gates of Fire: An Epic Novel of the Battle of Thermopylae total:1940|5:1002|4:636|3:234|2:54|1:15| 1940 8376 2682 380 5 7 false false Tue Jan 01 00:00:00 -0800 1991 Sat Jan 26 06:35:07 -0800 2008 Mon Feb 11 09:23:01 -0800 2008 Gates of Fire is one of my favorite books...ever. I first read it back when I was in the Marine Corps. It was on the Commandant’s Reading List for a time - required reading for any motivated teufelhund. The author himself is a former Marine, and draws upon his experiences to create a compellingly...more...]]> 5 5 false false Sat Apr 01 00:00:00 -0800 2000 Wed Oct 10 16:58:06 -0700 2007 Wed Oct 10 17:51:13 -0700 2007
Told from the perspective of a captured, critically wounded Spartan helot (all the Spartans died...more...]]> 5 3 false false Tue Jul 01 00:00:00 -0700 2008 Sun Jul 20 01:51:17 -0700 2008 Sun Jul 20 02:23:15 -0700 2008 more...]]> 2 0 false false Thu Nov 06 00:00:00 -0800 2008 Tue Sep 23 13:04:20 -0700 2008 Mon Jan 05 17:26:04 -0800 2009
I had to read this book for a Global class and the moment Sparta and Thermopylae were mentionesd I could feel the resentment rising in the pit of my stomach. I have nothing personal against the Spartans, except that battle strategies and arm...more...]]> 5 1 false false Wed Apr 30 07:39:02 -0700 2008 Sat Mar 08 15:20:27 -0800 2008 Wed Apr 30 07:39:02 -0700 2008 more...]]> 4 1 false false Sun Jul 01 00:00:00 -0700 2007 Mon Jul 16 05:40:26 -0700 2007 Mon Jul 16 05:48:38 -0700 2007
Athens, having all the good authors, good architects, good artists, good philosophers, etc. has tended to get portrayed pretty well.
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Pressfield’s book doe...more...]]> 4 4 false false Sat Jun 13 17:28:06 -0700 2009 Sat Jun 13 17:39:55 -0700 2009 more...]]> 4 0 false false Thu Nov 20 00:00:00 -0800 2008 Wed May 27 10:56:41 -0700 2009 Thu May 28 13:47:16 -0700 2009 more...]]> 5 0 false false Sat Jan 01 00:00:00 -0800 2005 Sun Sep 13 23:10:06 -0700 2009 Sun Sep 13 23:10:17 -0700 2009 more...]]> 5 0 false false Tue Nov 18 00:00:00 -0800 2008 Sat Nov 15 16:28:38 -0800 2008 Mon Dec 01 14:49:05 -0800 2008 Bingo. "Gates of Fire" is a fantastic book, but it's not something I ever would have picked up without the prodding of our group....more...]]> 5 1 false false Thu May 15 12:56:07 -0700 2008 Thu May 15 12:57:45 -0700 2008 No only men who fight are charactized as brave, but the women who give birth, raise, then send off to war are considered brave, tough, virto...more...]]> 5 1 false false Mon Apr 21 20:53:58 -0700 2008 Mon May 12 12:36:24 -0700 2008
Violence? Check.

Plot? Check.

Realistic dialogue? Check.

That pretty much covers it here.

]]> 5 0 false false Tue May 01 00:00:00 -0700 2007 Fri Dec 05 15:04:11 -0800 2008 Fri Dec 05 15:10:58 -0800 2008 1
Pressfield has a gre...more...]]> 5 1 false false Tue Aug 26 00:00:00 -0700 2008 Wed Aug 06 16:19:23 -0700 2008 Tue Aug 26 18:07:57 -0700 2008 4 0 false false Mon Jan 01 00:00:00 -0800 2007 Tue Mar 24 11:18:52 -0700 2009 Tue Apr 14 01:43:24 -0700 2009
I'm a huge fan of historical fiction. The battle of the pass at Thermopylae still stands as one of the most awe inspiring tactical encounters the world has ever seen and proof that often the truth is more incredible than fiction.

The story follows a...more...]]>