Advice to a Tyrant
St Edward’s was delighted to host Dr Steve Kershaw from Oxford University Department for Continuing Education on Tuesday 3rd May. Dr Kershaw gave a fascinating lecture as part of the twice-termly speaker events run by the Lyne Society on a range of classical topics.
Sixth Form pupil, Millie Cooper, reviews the event.
What you may not realise about Putin’s current invasion of Ukraine is that it is remarkably parallel to the two Persian Invasions of Greece in the early 5th Century BCE. This was an underlying current of Dr Steve Kershaw’s talk to Lyne Soc and Academic Forum on Tuesday evening entitled ‘The Persian Invasions of Greece, or Lessons to a Tyrant on How Not to Invade a Free People’. A previous Ancient History and double bass/guitar teacher at Teddies, Dr Kershaw treated us to some of his rock, before the lecture began.He then took us from the deep-seated, bronze age part-legendary causes of their inter-racial hostility, through the Ionic Revolt and then to the famous battles of Marathon (490), Thermopylae & Salamis (480) and Plataea in the following year. He successfully negotiated the myth from reality, whether found in Herodotus’ account or Zack Snyder’s. The Persian revenge seekers, although being the far larger and likely victors, were three times defeated by the Greeks. The driving force of the Greeks was their desire for freedom and determination to live, as opposed to their largely conscripted and mercenary foes. The faults of the Persian leadership can be summed up in Xerxes’ hubris: he yearned for a victory at sea but was defeated, thus cramming the underworld with a myriad of young Persians, trading their lives for his own. The questions that followed allowed for the parallels between the ongoing war in Ukraine to be further developed, rueing the lessons from history. So inspired were many that they signed up to buy Dr Kershaw’s latest book of his seven: Three epic battles that saved democracy.
This was a perfect way to conclude a fantastic year of classical lectures, from the nature of Roman comedy, via Tolkien’s classical inspiration, to an ‘idiot’s guide to undermining dictators’.