Book Review Courtesans and Fishcakes - 1251 Words

Courtesans and Fishcakes written by James Davidson explore the ancient Greek culture of the Athenians and elaborate on not only the desire for sex, but the appetites of life. Author James Davidson is a professor in the Department of Classics and Ancient History at the University of Warwick. In his biography, it says that he is a regular contributor to the London Review of Book and the author of the award winning The Greeks and Greek Love. Courtesans and Fishcakes is divided into four parts: Feasts, Desire, The Citizen, and The City. Within each part of the book, there are multiple sub-sections that go into depth about the particular section of each ‘chapter’. In Part I: Feasts, Davidson goes into some background of the ancient Greek†¦show more content†¦Personally, I think this is brilliant insight to the Athenian culture. It makes sense to watch and monitor the behaviors of the people around you because their everyday manners and behaviors are distinct indicato rs to how they live the rest of their life outside of the ‘feasts’. As Davidson explains it, â€Å"†¦ Ancient texts do more than inform us about Ancient desires. They do more than provide us with samples of the ancient discourse of desires.† The next topic that Davidson nicely delivers the reader insight to is the act of drinking. He states, â€Å"One drinks while one eats and one always eats with others; a narrow sociality oversees the pleasures of food†¦Ã¢â‚¬  I had to carefully read and re-read this paragraph to understand the brilliant meaning behind it. As I continued reading, I began to understand that the act of drinking wine has always been one to socialize. It was to strike up conversation and this quote means exactly that, with those who eat, drink, and become social. Once again, I think this a perfect quote to support Davidson’s argument because it emphasizes that drinking was a social act. This also means that anything else besides being social while drinking was a direct indicator that one might have little self-control and be a threat to the democracy. Davidson says, â€Å"... words join water in diluting the wine whose proper role is to facilitate conversation.† This is to emphasize t hat when this does notShow MoreRelatedThe Appetite Of Classical Athens1763 Words   |  8 Pagessacrifice and is a regular contributor to The London Review of Books, The Guardian, The Daily Telegraph and the Sunday Times. He has just published The Greeks and The Greeks Love for Weidenfeld and is currently working on a translation of some Attic speeches for Penguin Classics. James Davidson’s first book, Courtesans and Fishcakes: The Consuming Passion of Classical Athens was published in 1997 and will be the book we will talk about throughout this review. Davidson takes us inside the minds of classical