SOURCE: Parry, Stanley. “The Great Tradition.” National Review 19, no. 15 (18 April 1967): 423-24.

In the following review, Parry views Socrates and Aristophanes as an exploration of the relationship between reason and religion, “and resolves this by an analysis of the function of comedy in the life of the city.”

In Socrates and Aristophanes Leo Strauss gives us an impressive addition to his life's work—the recovery of the Great Tradition in political philosophy. The problem the book proposes centers formally upon Socrates. As is typical of Strauss, he raises profound issues with great courage. Francis Cornford, in his Before and After Socrates, has given us the best study of the revolution in thought precipitated by Socrates through the invention of political philosophy. With Socrates man first begins a disciplined philosophical inquiry into the nature of man, of society, of ethical conduct, and of the good life. As a result Socrates...