This essay is a "review" of Xenophon's Persian Expedition, with some consideration of its relevance for understanding ancient literature and history in general. It includes a comparison and contrast with Montesquieu's Persian Letters, in terms of their both presenting descriptions from the viewpoint of outsiders of lands other than their own. The Persian Expedition is the account of how a group of Greek mercenary soldiers found themselves stuck in the middle of Persia after their employer Cyrus lost his battle to usurp the throne of his brother, and elected to find their way home rather than submit to King Artaxerxes II. Xenophon was one of the men chosen to be a general of this band of the "Ten Thousand," and apparently wrote this account in order to play up his own role in these events, since other accounts of them apparently took almost no notice of him at all. The translator comments that Xenophon's Anabasis, or "The March Up-Country," was the plague of high school Greek students for many years, until more modern educational curricula were put in place early in the twentieth century. Students allowed to read it in good English prose generally like it much more than did those who had to read it in Greek.
Xenophon's political position was difficult, as an Athenian working for the Spartans. He was a follower and biographer of Socrates, and author of several other books. His literary career, like Machiavelli's, followed from his loss of personal political position.
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