Socrates is revered as a man who spoke truth to power. Yet his death in 399 BC was the first time in recorded history that a democratic government condemned a person to death for their beliefs. His death was a potent symbol of free speech, and Socrates' fate has haunted Western thought ever since - a guiding influence on Plato, John Stuart Mills, Nietzsche and Martin Luther King.

In this incisive survey of philosophy and politics, renowned classicist and translator Emily Wilson unravels ancient philosophy's most enduring - and hardest - questions: why did ancient Athens execute its leading intellectual? How do democracies deal with dissent? And can our own society allow for total freedom of speech and thought?

Socrates is revered as a man who spoke truth to power. Yet his death in 399 BC was the first time in recorded history that a democratic government condemned a person to death for their beliefs. His death was a potent symbol of free speech, and Socrates' fate has haunted Western thought ever since - a guiding influence on Plato, John Stuart Mills, Nietzsche and Martin Luther King.

In this incisive survey of philosophy and politics, renowned classicist and translator Emily Wilson unravels ancient philosophy's most enduring - and hardest - questions: why did ancient Athens execute its leading intellectual? How do democracies deal with dissent? And can our own society allow for total freedom of speech and thought?