As befits a good Stoic, Farnsworth’s expository prose exhibits both clarity and an unflappable calm ... Throughout The Practicing Stoic, Farnsworth beautifully integrates his own observations with scores of quotations from Epictetus, Seneca, Marcus Aurelius, Montaigne and others. As a result, this isn’t just a book to read—it’s a book to return to, a book that will provide perspective and consolation at times of heartbreak or calamity.
According to Ward Farnsworth, that understanding [that Stoics are unfeeling] is wrong, and he exonerates an unfairly impugned philosophy in his idiosyncratic, strange, yet convincing and useful volume ... his tone is erudite, patient, and at times dryly whimsical ... providing short, elegant commentary on quotes that contend with whatever is under discussion. Despite sometimes being dry, he is insightful; though he is occasionally repetitive, he is convincing. Farnworth’s prose, is, well, stoic, but it’s also useful—as it should be.
After a wide-ranging introduction, he offers brief headnotes to accompany a smorgasbord of quotations from his sources meant to illustrate the central stoic teaching on the announced topic. The result is a charming book, perfect for dipping, in which the calm and settling wisdom of the stoics shines forth with bracing clarity ... My one cavil is that the book lacks an index. It makes up for it, however, in the beautifully legible typography and sheer wealth of reference that Farnsworth has marshaled. This is a book any thoughtful person will be glad to have along as a companion for an extended weekend or, indeed, for that protracted journey we call life.
With a practical aim, he focuses on the techniques Stoics used to order oneself according to virtue, such as analyzing value judgments, intentional perspective, and detachment. Extensive quotations both enhance the presentation of Stoicism and counter the typical criticism that Stoics were unfeeling ... Scholars are bound to object that Farnsworth has not placed Stoicism on the intellectual footing it deserves. What's certain is that he has rightly transformed the idea of being stoical, from one being coldly logical to warmly philosophical.
This sturdy and engaging introductory text consists mostly of excerpts from the ancient Greek and Roman Stoic philosophers, especially Seneca (4 BCE–65), Epictetus (c. 55–135) through his student Arrian, and Marcus Aurelius (121–80) as well as that trio’s philosophical confreres, from the earlier Hellenic Stoics and Cicero to such contemporaries as Plutarch to moderns, including Montaigne, Adam Smith, and Schopenhauer ... A philosophy to live by, Stoicism may remind many of Buddhism and Quakerism, for it asks of practitioners something very similar to what those disciplines call mindfulness.
