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Type of bind: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 813.54
EAN num: 9780553383683
ISBN number: 055338368X
Label: Bantam
Manufacturer: Bantam
Quantity: 1
Page Count: 400
Printing Date: September 27, 2005
Publishing house: Bantam
Release Date: September 27, 2005
Sale Popularity Level: 1829
Studio: Bantam
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Go tell the Spartans, stranger passing by, that here obedient to their laws we lie.
Thus reads an ancient stone at Thermopylae in northern Greece, the site of one of the world's greatest battles for freedom. Here, in 480 B.C., on a narrow mountain pass above the crystalline Aegean, 300 Spartan knights and their allies faced the massive forces of Xerxes, King of Persia. From the start, there was no question but that the Spartans would perish. In Gates of Fire, however, Steven Pressfield makes their courageous defense--and eventual extinction--unbearably suspenseful.
In the tradition of Mary Renault, this historical novel unfolds in flashback. Xeo, the sole Spartan survivor of Thermopylae, has been captured by the Persians, and Xerxes himself presses his young captive to reveal how his tiny cohort kept more than 100,000 Persians at bay for a week. Xeo, however, begins at the beginning, when his childhood home in northern Greece was overrun and he escaped to Sparta. There he is drafted into the elite Spartan guard and rigorously schooled in the art of war--an education brutal enough to destroy half the students, but (oddly enough) not without humor: 'The more miserable the conditions, the more convulsing the jokes became, or at least that's how it seems,' Xeo recalls. His companions in arms are Alexandros, a gentle boy who turns out to be the most courageous of all, and Rooster, an angry, half-Messenian youth.
Pressfield's descriptions of war are breathtaking in their immediacy. They are also meticulously assembled out of physical detail and crisp, uncluttered metaphor: The forerank of the enemy collapsed immediately as the very first shock hit it; the body-length shields seemed to implode rearward, their anchoring spikes rooted slinging from the earth like tent pins in a gale. The forerank archers were literally bowled off their feet, their wall-like shields caving in upon them like fortress redoubts under the assault of the ram.... The valour of the individual Medes was beyond question, but their light hacking blades were harmless as toys; against the massed wall of Spartan armor, they might as well have been defending themselves with reeds or fennel stalks.
Alas, even this human barrier was bound to collapse, as we knew all along it would. 'War is work, not mystery,' Xeo laments. But Pressfield's epic seems to make the opposite argument: courage on this scale is not merely inspiring but ultimately mysterious. --Marianne Painter
Product Description:
The national bestseller!
At Thermopylae, a rocky mountain pass in northern Greece, the feared and admired Spartan soldiers stood three hundred strong. Theirs was a suicide mission, to hold the pass against the invading millions of the mighty Persian army.
Day after bloody day they withstood the terrible onslaught, buying time for the Greeks to rally their forces. Born into a cult of spiritual courage, physical endurance, and unmatched battle skill, the Spartans would be remembered for the greatest military stand in history--one that would not end until the rocks were awash with blood, leaving only one gravely injured Spartan squire to tell the tale....
From the Paperback edition.
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Rated by buyers 
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Any fan of ancient history will soak this exciting novel up.
Pressfield draws you in with intriguing well developed characters and a great blend of fiction woven into historical facts and events.
Heartily recommended!
Rated by buyers -
This book is simply beautiful. Numerous times I had to remind myself that this book was fiction. The attention to detail Mr. Pressfield put into this story is simply amazing. The prose was as rich and wonderful as any author out there, living or dead. This book is why we readers read! A great, great retelling of a classic story.
Rated by buyers -
In 480 B.C., the Battle of Thermopylae changed world history forever, though in some perverse way, yesterday we revisit some of the roots of this singular conflict among powers.
Don't mind those few critics. Gates of Fire is a beautiful work, lavish and elaborate. Indulge it, lose yourself in it, and be ever mindful of your own terribly easy life. Xeo is an unlikely hero, fully believable. Forgiveness is a rather subtle theme. Life was harsh then.
The structure of this story is fantastically clever; the narration is masterful; the history is brought shockingly and accurately to life (and death). There is enough blood, guts, and slaughter to last a reader a month, enough love and devotion to simply last. There's almost no stereotyping, virtually no sex, and no backing off ugliness and horror. How anyone survived even daily life, let along the exigencies of injury, famine and disease is nothing short of miraculous. The rigors and excessive humiliation of boys-becoming-soldiers stuns one's sensibilities.
Dienekes' poser (page 231), "What is the opposite of fear?" enlightens. It is the central theme of this epic novel of the Battle of Thermopylae. The answer, 100 pages later, does not surprise as much as it verifies - not only the idiocy of war but the central fact of relations among men (and women).
While ostensibly this story regales and sanctifies the cunning and valour of the astonishingly courageous men (on both sides) who fought and (mostly) died at Thermopylae, the historically unsung role and place of the women of Sparta shines through the gore and misery of battle. Females are the real backbone of this warrior culture. Why is that not surprising?
Description of armies fighting as units, not individuals, inspires. Leadership is known by both acts and words. Failure is unacceptable, although death is. Camaraderie abounds amid desolation and despair. We have no idea yesterday of the misery of war back then.
Imparting a philosophy of life and war is a duty held by leaders, and they succeed. They teach that to die for one's principles, for the future of others, and for one's "nation" is never a sacrifice, but rather an honor.
Pressfield's battlefield descriptions awe and appall. Page 275, "Across this farmer's field of death lay sown such a crop of corpses and shields, hacked-up armour and shattered weapons, that the mind could not assimilate its scale nor the sense give it compass. The wounded, in limbs and severed body parts so intertangled one could not distinguish individual men, but the whole seemed a Gorgon-like beast of ten thousand limbs, some ghastly monster spawned by the cloven earth and now draining itself, fluid by fluid, back into that chthonic cleft which had given it birth."
Who could ask for anything more?
Rated by buyers -
If there is anyone out there who would like to become a connoisseur of historical fiction, look no further than Pressfield's 'Gates of Fire'.
The characters are written so convincingly you can almost feel them standing behind your shoulder. Xeo, Alexandros, Polynikes, Dienekes---all of them bring their own charm to the tale, giving a voice to the pages of history. The battles are described so masterfully you can feel the shock of clashing shield lines and smell the leather, sweat, and blood. The author unfolds the landscape and clime of Greece with his compelling prose and infuses a impressive amount of historical fact into the text.
Pressfield brings the Spartans to life. Skip '300'. Pick up 'Gates of Fire.'
Rated by buyers 
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This book was purchased after seeing the movie 'The 300'. It offers a wealth of detail, which no movie can incorporate, on ancient Greek history, culture and attitudes. In the tradition of Mary Renault, this book makes ancient Greek history accessible by means of well researched novelization.
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