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  • Open Daily: 10am - 10pm
    Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm

    3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
    612-822-4611

Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm
3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
612-822-4611
How to Find Happiness: An Ancient Guide to the Good Life

How to Find Happiness: An Ancient Guide to the Good Life

Volk, Katharina
Volk, Katharina
Cicero, Marcus Tullius

Hardcover

Series: Ancient Wisdom for Modern Readers

PhilosophySelf-Help

Publisher Price: $18.95

PREORDER - Expected ship date February 24, 2026

ISBN10: 0691263396
ISBN13: 9780691263397
Publisher: Princeton University Press
Published: Feb 24 2026
Pages: 256
Language: English

Does happiness come from the pursuit of pleasure or moral virtue? A vivid new translation of Cicero's exploration of a timeless question

Of course, we all want to be happy. So wrote the Roman statesman, orator, and philosopher Marcus Tullius Cicero. He and his fellow Greek and Roman philosophers agreed that the secret to happiness--or what they called the good life--is pursuing the greatest good. The only problem is that they couldn't agree on what the greatest good is. Cicero addressed this dilemma by composing a set of dialogues, On the Greatest Good and Evil (De finibus bonorum et malorum), in which he pitted advocates of different philosophical approaches to happiness against one another. Notably, these include the Epicureans (who believe that the greatest good is pleasure) and the Stoics (according to whom it is moral virtue). Rather than choosing sides, Cicero considers the pros and cons of the different philosophies, ultimately leaving it to his readers to make up their own minds. In How to Find Happiness, Katharina Volk offers a vivid new translation of selections from Cicero's work, complete with an introduction and the original Latin text on facing pages. The result is a lively and engaging debate that invites each of us to discover our own path to happiness.

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