The Republic

What is justice? Socrates and his companions set out to answer this question and end up designing an entire civilisation from scratch. Across ten books, the Republic moves from a deceptively simple conversation about old age and honesty to the architecture of the ideal city, the training of its guardians, the philosopher's ascent from the cave of shadows to the light of the Good, the decline of political systems from aristocracy to tyranny, and a myth of the afterlife where souls choose their next incarnation. It is at once a work of political philosophy, moral psychology, metaphysics, aesthetics, and education — the founding text of Western philosophy. This edition includes Jowett's extensive Introduction and Analysis. Translated by Benjamin Jowett.