Plutarch: Alexander: Translated with an Introduction and Commentary

Plutarch’s Life of Alexander is one of the most influential ancient accounts of Alexander the Great, concerned as much with character and moral judgement as with the sequence of conquest. Christopher Pelling’s edition presents a new translation together with an extensive introduction and commentary that situate Plutarch’s biography within Greek literary culture and the traditions surrounding Alexander.

Plutarch’s Alexander is brilliant and ambitious, but the portrait darkens as success gives way to suspicion of his friends and fear within his court. Pelling examines how Plutarch selected and shaped stories from an abundant, often conflicting body of evidence, and where those stories sit alongside other accounts of Alexander’s campaigns and final years. He tests which episodes can illuminate Alexander’s career and which tell us more about Plutarch’s purpose as a biographer.