Xenophon
Xenophon ( c. 430 – 352 BC ),Athenian historian who left an account of a military expedition in which he participated (Anabasis), a history of his own times (Hellenica), a panegyric on a contemporary monarch (Agesilaus), chatty memoirs about Socrates (Memorabilia, Symposium), and treatises on domestic economy, horsemanship, and hunting. His most popular work was however the Cyropedia, a fictionalized biography of the Persian king Cyrus . This created a vogue for such biographies in which the fictional element became progressively greater until the world saw the emergence of a new genre—the novel. The Cyropedia was translated into English by William Barker ( ?1552 ), contributed a story to Painter's Palace of Pleasure ( 1566 ), and was described by Sidney as an ‘absolute heroical poem’. Milton , on the other hand, spoke highly of the...
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