Reviews

How to Die: An Ancient Guide to the End of Life by Lucius Annaeus Seneca

lostintranslation's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional reflective slow-paced

5.0

j3d's review against another edition

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dark informative slow-paced

5.0

stephenmeansme's review against another edition

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3.0

3.5 stars rounded down for the audiobook narration.

The actual text has some real whammy passages, so I do want to read Seneca more fully: maybe even this specific book in paper form. The problem is that the audiobook narration is quite uninspired. It was hard for me to distinguish between the editorial parts and the Seneca parts, and the narrator used a mostly flat cadence that didn't do Seneca's prose (er, translated epistolary verse?) any favors.

hades9stages's review against another edition

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1.0

i hated this

hades9stages's review against another edition

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1.0

i hated this

thephilosopher's review against another edition

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reflective medium-paced

4.0

flickflickcity's review against another edition

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5.0

Surprisingly gentle and colloquial for such macabre content. “A life lived without the courage to die is slavery.”
The chosen highlights from Seneca’s work and letters allow of a great breadth of understanding regarding his stoicism. Despite the occasional gore and encouragement to embrace death, it feels empowering and optimistic.

tr3bl3's review against another edition

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hopeful inspiring reflective medium-paced

5.0

pizzamcpin3ppl3's review against another edition

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dark hopeful informative inspiring reflective sad medium-paced

4.75

rhea_kassiopea's review against another edition

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4.0

Great collection of Seneca's stoic philosophy on why death shouldn't be feared and how to live life aware af your own and world's mortalilty and finality.

Added bonus: half the book is in original latin text.

Informative notes in the appendix.

Texts are often repetitative since the collection spans across mulitiple of his different letters and writings.