Plotinus : an introduction to the Enneads /

A very good introduction to Plotinus. The subject is not very promising: "philosophers in England and North America have tended in general for most of the century to dismiss Plotinus as an irrational mystic or esoteric metaphysician, a marginal and negligible figure" (p.111). However, beginners, and others, are very well served by O'Meara, who sympathetically places Plotinus within the intellectual and religious context of his times amid the competing philosophical schools and the turmoils of Gnosticism and a burgeoning Christianity. Major topics in Plotinus and Neoplatonism are introduced and discussed in measured and meaningful fashion, an impressive achievement: soul and body, intelligible and sensible reality, intellect, the One, speaking of the ineffable, evil, beauty, and mysticism. There is an introduction to Plotinus' life and works and an epilogue on Plotinus' important place in Western thought. The book ends with an up-to-date, helpful guide to further reading, a bibliography, and indexes of Plotinian texts cited and of terms and themes. Recommended for all academic libraries, both undergraduate and graduate level. N. A. Greenberg; Oberlin College