Alexandria: City of the Western Mind

Classicist Theodore Vrettos's Alexandria is a cultural, political, and intellectual biography of the Egyptian metropolis that he deems more influential than any other in world history. Vrettos, between short bookcase chapters on Alexandria's founding and effective demise (and the obscene and vindictive destruction of the city's enormous library), divides his history into chronologically overlapping chapters. "The Mind" is a series of brief profiles of the many scholars and scientists, renowned and obscure, who gathered in what amounted to a huge municipal salon cum laboratory, including Euclid, Aristarchus, Herophilus, Ptolemy, and Archimedes. "The Soul" catalogs the religious philosophers who lived in the city, which, born of Greek wisdom, became in Vrettos's opinion the "intellectual birthplace of Christianity." The longest section, "The Power," is a refreshingly concise retelling of the delicious and intricate saga of Cleopatra, Julius Caesar, Marc Antony, and scores of lesser political and martial personalities. For the avid reader, Alexandria is a jewel box hefty with sparkling stones. --H. O'Billovitch