07-18-2008, 03:38 AM
Here is an old but none the less interesting interview with Steven Pressfield about Gates of Fire. His views on writers, research, and re-enactors are... well read and decide for yourself.
[size=150:1c5a2113]Gates of Fire[/size]
Richard Lee talks to Steven Pressfield about his new novel
Gates of Fire first came to my attention when it knocked Stephen King’s The Green Mile from the top of the Guardian UK bestsellers list in February last year. An unknown author, writing historical fiction, going straight in at the number one slot? It had to be good.
Gates of Fire tells the story of Thermopylae, one of the most famous of ancient battles. Notoriously, 300 Spartans along with no more than 7,000 allied Greeks, held off an attacking army of (Herodotus tells us) 2 million Persians for several days. The behaviour of all the Greeks was heroic, but that of the Spartans was absurdly so. In the end they died to the last man, refusing to surrender. But their self-sacrifice bought time for the Greek City States. What followed were the Persian defeats at Salamis and Plataea. Ancient and modern historians unite in seeing the battle as one of the great turning points.
Pressfield tells the story of Xeones, one of the survivors of the battle. He is taken, wounded, before Xerxes, and asked to explain “who were these foemen, who had taken with them to the house of the dead ten or, as some reports said, as many as twenty for every one of their own fallen?â€
[size=150:1c5a2113]Gates of Fire[/size]
Richard Lee talks to Steven Pressfield about his new novel
Gates of Fire first came to my attention when it knocked Stephen King’s The Green Mile from the top of the Guardian UK bestsellers list in February last year. An unknown author, writing historical fiction, going straight in at the number one slot? It had to be good.
Gates of Fire tells the story of Thermopylae, one of the most famous of ancient battles. Notoriously, 300 Spartans along with no more than 7,000 allied Greeks, held off an attacking army of (Herodotus tells us) 2 million Persians for several days. The behaviour of all the Greeks was heroic, but that of the Spartans was absurdly so. In the end they died to the last man, refusing to surrender. But their self-sacrifice bought time for the Greek City States. What followed were the Persian defeats at Salamis and Plataea. Ancient and modern historians unite in seeing the battle as one of the great turning points.
Pressfield tells the story of Xeones, one of the survivors of the battle. He is taken, wounded, before Xerxes, and asked to explain “who were these foemen, who had taken with them to the house of the dead ten or, as some reports said, as many as twenty for every one of their own fallen?â€
David Reinke
Burbank CA
Burbank CA
