Book Two, Letter Five

To Xenophon on the Education of Cyrus

Dear Xenophon,

I'm going to start with Bukowski. Ahh... Bukowski.

The miracle

To work with an art form

does not mean to

screw off like a tapeworm

with his belly full.

Nor does it justify grandeur

or greed, nor at all times

seriousness, but I would guess

that it calls upon the best of men

at their best times,

and when they die

and something else does not,

we have seen the miracle of immortality:

men arrived as men,

departed as gods -

gods we knew were here,

gods that now let us go on

when all else says stop.

Xenophon, I had you all wrong. I thought you were just an old soldier, telling tales of old glory and military custom. You wrote books on history and horsemanship. I thought that's all you were. Then I found out you studied with Socrates, and then I found the Cyropaedia.

Cyropaedia: The Education of Cyrus is a work of such magnificence and inspiring beauty that it....hmm, no that's not how I want to start this. I don't want to just heap praise upon you like a springtime romance. I want to really feel this one out. I want to ask...what is this story really about?

The wisdom of children? Or the fictions that are more important than truths? Cyropaedia is beautiful, inspiring, complex, funny and humbling. The way I could describe it, is that it is a philosophical work woven through a sort of fictional biography of a real king, but most of the things you describe never really happened to him. It is a dream, a utopia. It is a tale of grace and kindness and love and good judgement and the learning of hard lessons, of grandfathers and fathers and sons. It is these fictional truths that really amaze me. “Never was there a king so wise nor subjects so happy in their subjection.” This is a tale painted with the romance of war, royalty, loyalty, nobility and intellect. It is a beautiful lie, and we know it is a lie, but we still want to believe in the ideals the characters live by.

A hero like your Cyrus is a philosophical fairy story, and like all good fiction stories, it is about truth. It is a dream. The wisdom of the boy prince is a glowing coal, a glowing goal in my imagination and I have eagerly awaited the chance to tell some of those stories to my son. So I guess that's what I'll write to you Xenophon. This is how I would tell my eight year old son, one of the stories from the young life of Cyrus, King of the Achaemenid Persian Empire. Of course, I am going to steal without compunction from the H.G. Daykins translation I have, adapting and shortening it to my purpose.

*

                                                               Cyrus: King of Persia

           

There was a boy named Cyrus, a prince who knew how to see the truth, and all his life he used this power to see through to the heart of people and of problems. He knew how to give men what they wanted and rewarded those who served him well. He was both clever and kind, cunning and compassionate, honest and poetic. Such was his spirit that as a man he inspired magnificent service from his friends and allies, who were all willing to stake their lives on his cause and who competed to outdo each other in heroism and generosity towards him.

In his youth, Cyrus lived with his grandfather Astyages, the King of the Medes. The two loved each other very much, and the King would never refuse the boy when he wanted to keep company with him. They would talk about everything, enjoying each other's wit, intellect, sincerity and warmth.

Cyrus loved to ride his horse and to shoot a bow and throw a spear, and he worked hard to be the best among his friends, but also the most humble. He would always encourage his friends on their hunts in the royal parks, cheering their successes and laughing with kindness at their mistakes. But as time went on, Cyrus and his friends grew weary of the poor beasts in the little hunting grounds of the palace, and wanted to hunt wild boar and deer in the forests beyond the palace. His friends begged him to seek permission from the king, for Cyrus was known to have great skill in persuasion, and if the king allowed it, the boy's parents would allow them to go also. But Cyrus was reluctant.

“I cannot think what has come over me,” Cyrus told his friends, “I cannot speak to my grandfather any more; I cannot look him straight in the face. If this fit grows on me I fear I shall become no better than an idiot. And yet, when I was a boy, they tell me, I was sharp enough at talking.”

His friends retorted, “Well, if you can do nothing for us in our hour of need, we must turn elsewhere.” When Cyrus heard that he was stung to the quick. He went away in silence and stirred himself to put on a bold face, and so went to see his grandfather, though not without first planning how he could best bring in the matter.

Cyrus stood before Astyages the King, his grandfather, and asked: “If a slave ran away, and you caught him, what would you do to him?”

The King replied: “I would clap irons on him and force him to work in chains.”

“And if the slave returned of his own free will?” Asked Cyrus.

“Why, I would give him a whipping, as a warning not to do it again, and then treat him as if nothing had happened.” said the King.

“Then you should prepare your birch whips, because I am going to run away and go hunting in the wilds with my friends. When I return you can punish me any way you see fit.”

“Very kind of you to tell me beforehand,” said Astyages, “And now listen, I forbid you to set foot outside the palace grounds. A pretty thing” he added, “if for he sake of a day's hunting I should let my daughter's lamb get lost.”

So Cyrus did as his grandfather ordered and stayed at home, but he spent his days in silence and his brow was clouded. At last Astyages saw how bitterly the lad felt it, and he made up his mind to please him by leading out a hunting party himself.

When out on the hunt, riding together through the forests and hills, the king was overjoyed to see the way that Cyrus would applaud his friends successes and laugh at their mistakes, but all without the slightest touch of jealousy. Their time together was so wonderful that ever after, whenever Astyages would go hunting, he would take Cyrus, and never failed to take his friends as well, “to please Cyrus.”

Thus did Cyrus spend his early life, sharing in and helping towards the happiness of all, and bringing no sorrow to any man.

*

There is something important about the beautiful lie.

Without these romanticised versions of reality, all we have is reality.

I want to believe in a boy Prince who was wise and kind and special. I want to believe in the idea that a noble and virtuous man might exist, or has existed, and that I might strive to be like him. Inspired by his virtue. Inspired by the fantasy.

Is that what this is? Fantasy? Is that what philosophy is? The dream of a better world where we understand ourselves and we understand each other and though life is full of ignorance and suffering, we can be wise enough to make good choices. We can be generous enough to give without expectation.

Thucydides said that history is philosophy taught by example.

Xenophon, I ask you this. Is Cyropaedia a speculative philosophical fantasy novel? A utopian lightning rod? I think that you want me to believe in something. You want me to believe that such a man as your Cyrus could exist, and you want me to believe that this imaginary prince, with his noble virtues and generous spirit, might teach me something about being a man.

Reading The education of Cyrus is an opportunity to re-live my own childhood, and take on all the lessons of this Prince among Princes, this King of Kings, mixing them in with all my own experiences, and from that intermingling, a new wisdom might emerge, through me.

It's not enough to just say that the wisdom of the ancient world is alive through these books.

The wisdom must come to life through me. Today.

Whatever wisdom there be.

Thank you Xenophon.

PS. My father was a hunter, so I suppose that I was drawn in particular to this story, in part, because of that. I remember the wild goat horns above my bed as a child, and the wild boar tusks in the lounge room. There are more stories there, but they are for another time.

                                                                                       
                                                  My Father, with the first wild boar he ever hunted.             

                                               My Father, much later in life, hunting Pheasant.