Our Lost Classical Learning

Ancient Athens was perhaps the first state in history in which substantial numbers of citizens were literate, and ideas were able to circulate freely. Literacy eroded the gulf between rulers and ruled and made possible the creation of a radically new kind of human society. For perhaps the first time, every free man could criticise and question officials and this was often portrayed as desirable and valuable. In literature at least, soldiers could even question their commanders—as Creon’s guards do in Sophocles’ Antigone. These freedoms extended to some playwrights and actors themselves. The anti-war comedies of Aristophanes were performed in the middle of the horrific Peloponnesian War.