A moving meditation on recent geopolitical crises, viewed through the lens of ancient and modern tragedy
"Spare, elegant and poignant. . . . If there is a single contemporary book that should be pressed into the hands of those who decide issues of war and peace, this is it."-John Gray, New Statesman
"It is tragic that Robert D. Kaplan's luminous The Tragic Mind is so urgently needed."-George F. Will
Some books emerge from a lifetime of hard-won knowledge. Robert D. Kaplan has learned, from a career spent reporting on wars, revolutions, and international politics in Europe, the Middle East, and East Asia, that the essence of geopolitics is tragedy. In The Tragic Mind, he employs the works of ancient Greek dramatists, Shakespeare, German philosophers, and the modern classics to explore the central subjects of international politics: order, disorder, rebellion, ambition, loyalty to family and state, violence, and the mistakes of power.