In Pangle's view, Nietzsche's ambitions, as those of modern philosophy as a whole, broke with the humbler aims of classical, Socratic philosophizing, which 'conceives the critical study of moral opinions and human psychology as the key to unraveling the universe's greatest mystery' (3). Nietzsche found in Xenophon's Socrates a 'wisdom full of roguish trickery' (1), and trickery, if not roguishness, will be a key theme in Pangle's book. Instead he begins with Nietzsche (also a thinker of great importance for Strauss). While Pangle frequently cites Strauss, he rather curiously (or perhaps esoterically?) does not directly address his debt to him, or the similarity of his book to Strauss's. But Pangle's approach and his conclusions are in keeping with those of Strauss, and most readers will judge Pangle's book based on their view of the merits of the Straussian approach. Pangle also includes frequent citations of secondary scholarship, unlike Strauss, including references to many 'conventional,' i.e., non-Straussian, scholars. Refreshingly, Pangle does disagree with Strauss on some matters, sometimes explicitly. It is not nearly as obscure as Strauss's late work on Xenophon, making Pangle's book the most accessible Straussian account of Xenophon's Socrates available to us. This is an impressive book, full of fine insights and close observations, clearly and engagingly written.

Like his master, Pangle offers close readings of each chapter of Xenophon's work, employing all the techniques familiar to readers of Straussian scholarship.

Pangle's book is, in form, method, and substance, a new version of the commentary on Xenophon's Memorabilia published by his teacher, Leo Strauss, as the main part of Strauss's 1972 book Xenophon's Socrates.

Conversations of Socrates by Xenophon