This growing reading list collects opinion pieces and scholarly work on the Discipline of Action, its myriad applications, and the creative efforts of modern practitioners to develop new Stoic approaches to life in the 21st century.

Stoic philosophy interacts in rich and complex ways with action, ethics, empathy, politics, and activism.

The philosophy’s focus on our individual deliberations, roles, and benevolent intentions makes it highly relevant to our real social lives.  The demands of Stoic “cosmic citizenship” begin with our closest relationships and extend outward from there into all levels of economic and political life.

Politically, the shared themes of cosmopolitanism, non-retribution, altruism, and social engagement are a mainstay of all Stoic thought.  But because the focus of ancient Stoic literature is more on personal character and action than on ideological systems or statecraft, practicing Stoics can and do hold a variety of political opinions.

With this in mind, we’ve loosely organized these readings—like the rest of this site—around our modified rendition of the Circles of Hierocles, albeit with the recognition that we will find diverse opinions in the Stoic community at every level of this model:

Theory

Philosophy as Social Engagement

• Pierre Hadot, “Philosophy as a Way of Life,” in Philosophy as a Way of Life (Blackwell Publishing, 1995), pp. 264–276.
• A. A. Long, “Stoic Communitarianism and Normative Citizenship,” Social Philosophy & Policy 24(2): 241–261 (2007).
• Matt Van Natta, “The Stoic Love of Community,” Stoicism Today: Selected Writings II (2016), pp. 115–118.
• Chris Fisher, “Step out of the Epicurean Garden and into the Stoic Cosmopolis,” Traditional Stoicism (blog), 05 July, 2016.
• Massimo Pigliucci, “The Stoic Pledge,” How to Be a Stoic (blog), 27 February, 2017.
• Donald Robertson, “What’s the difference between stoicism and Stoicism?,” How to Think Like a Roman Emperor (blog), 03 January, 2018.
• A. A. Long, “Stoicisms Ancient and Modern,” Stoicism Today (blog), 06 October, 2018.

Caring about External Things

• Donald Robertson, “Why Everything isn’t Totally Indifferent to Stoics,” How to Think like a Roman Emperor (blog), 17 March, 2018.

Balancing Action with Self Cultivation

• Kevin Patrick, “ἐπιμέλεια ἑαυτὸν (Care of the Self),” Mountain Stoic (blog), 05 August, 2017.

Stoic Love & Compassion

• William O. Stephens, “Epictetus on How the Stoic Sage Loves,” Oxford Studies in Ancient Philosophy, XIV (1996): 193–210.
• Sarah Byers, “The psychology of compassion: Stoicism in City of God 9.5,” The Cambridge Critical Guide to the City of God (2012), pp. 130–148.
• René Brouwer, “Stoic Sympathy,” in E. Schliesser, Sympathy: A History (Oxford University Press, 2015), pp. 15–35.
• Tim LeBon, “How to Become Virtuous—Lessons from Compassion Focused Therapy (CFT),” Stoicism Today: Selected Writings II (2016), pp. 165–181.
• Zack Paul, “Stoicism and Compassion: A False Dichotomy,” Observer, 01 February, 2017.
• Massimo Pigliucci, “Stoic Advice: Is Compassion Possible, or Advisable, for a Stoic?”, How to Be a Stoic (blog), 10 June, 2017.
• Massimo Pigliucci, “Sympathy, empathy, and how a Stoic should relate to other people’s emotions,” How to Be a Stoic (blog), 17 July, 2017.
• Piotr Stankiewicz, “Stoicism and Auschwitz,” Stoicism Today (blog), 15 July, 2017.

Stoicism Meets Personal Development

• Amitabha Palmer, “How to be Epictetus in the Gym,” Stoicism Today (blog), 30 March, 2019.

Stoicism Meets Family

• Stoicism Today articles on parenting: Chris Lowe, Jan Fredrik-Braseth, Matt Van Natta, Leah Goldrick, Pete Abilla.
• Andrew McDuffee, “The Case against Polyamory: It’s not so much wrong as a waste of time,” Medium, 25 October, 2016.
• Massimo Pigliucci, “What Would a Stoic Do? The Problem with Infidelity,” How to Be a Stoic (blog), 26 January, 2017.
• Leah Goldrick, “Musonius Rufus’ Nurturing Stoic Family or Plato’s Guardian Automatons?,” Stoicism Today (blog), 22 April, 2017.
• Massimo Pigliucci, “Stoic advice: Stoicism and unhappy marriages,” How to Be a Stoic (blog), 21 July, 2017.
• Brittany Polat, “Happy Families: A Stoic Guide to Family Relationships,” Stoicism Today (blog), 04 November, 2017.
• Brittany Polat, “Shaping your child’s character, not personality,” Apparent Stoic (blog), 08 November, 2017.
• Liz Gloyn, The Ethics of Family in Seneca (Cambridge University Press, 2017).
• Gregory Sadler, “Stoicism, Erotic Love, and Relationships,” Stoicism Today (blog), 10 February, 2018.
• Massimo Pigliucci, “The ethics of the family in Seneca, III: the mystery of marriage,” How to Be a Stoic (blog), 14 May, 2018.
• Stewart Slater, “A Stoic Approach to Divorce and Child Separation,” Stoicism Today (blog), 01 June, 2019.

Stoicism Meets Career

• Stoicism Today articles on specific careers: the Stoic Lawyer, the Stoic Mayor, the Stoic Doctor, the Stoic Police Officer, the Stoic Marine, the Stoic Teacher.
• Francis Su, “Mathematics for Human Flourishing,” transcript of talk at the 2017 Joint Mathematics Meetings, Atlanta, Georgia, 06 January, 2017.
• Travis Hume, “Applying Stoicism: The Stoic Career,” Stoicism Today (blog), 04 February, 2017.
• Massimo Pigliucci, “Stoic Advice: Filing Complaints at Work,” How to Be a Stoic (blog), 14 February, 2017.
• Massimo Pigliucci, “Stoic advice: how does a Stoic do job hunting?,” How to Be a Stoic (blog), 06 May, 2017.
• Piotr Stankiewicz, “The Three Meanings of Stoic Work,” Stoicism Today, 02 September, 2017.
• Adam Piercy, “Stoicism in Tech: Coping with Criticism,” Stoicism Today (blog), 20 July, 2019.
• Donald Robertson, “Stoicism and the Military: Did Stoic Philosopher go to War?,” Medium, 11 February, 2020.

Stoicism Meets Service

• Jeff Traylor, Epictetus Club: Lessons from the Walls (Papillon Press, 2004).
• Massimo Pigliucci, “Stoic Advice: Effective Altruism,” How to Be a Stoic (blog), 05 July, 2017.
• Massimo Pigliucci, “Stoic Advice: Giving to the Homeless,” How to Be a Stoic (blog), 07 July, 2017.
• Patrick Herring, “Developing an Addiction to Public Service,” Medium, 12 June, 2018.
• John Sellers, “Introducing the Aurelius Foundation,” Stoicism Today (blog), 06 February, 2020.

Stoicism Meets Politics

• Robert R. Sherman, Democracy, Stoicism, and Education: An Essay in the History of Freedom and Reason (University of Florida Press, 1973).
• Fiala, Andrew. “Stoic tolerance.” Res Publica 9.2 (2003): 149-168.
• Mitsis, Phillip. “The stoics on property and politics.” The Southern journal of philosophy 43. Supplement (2005): 230-249.
• John Lombardini, “Stoicism and the Virtue of Toleration,” History of Political Thought 36.4 (2015): 643-669.
• Pat McGeehan, Stoicism and the Statehouse (Wythe-North Publishing, 2017).
• Donald Robertson, “Marcus Aurelius, Politics, and Freedom,” Stoic Resilience (blog), 03 August, 2017.
• Massimo Pigliucci, “Stoicism and Politics: between the Scylla of the New Left and the Charybdis of the alt-right,” How to Be a Stoic (blog), 07 August, 2017.
• Eric Scott, “Stoicism and the Statehouse – A Review and Interview with Pat McGeehan,” Stoicism Today (blog), 21 October, 2017.
• Donald Robertson, “Stoic Politics and the Republic of Zeno,” How to Think Like a Roman Emperor (blog), 23 November, 2017.
• Ryan Holiday, “Stoicism, Politics and Living Virtuously: An Interview with Nicholas Sarwark, Chairman of the Libertarian National Party,” The Daily Stoic (blog), December, 2017.
• Massimo Pigliucci, “Nobody Expects the Stoic Opposition!,” How to Be a Stoic (blog), 15 February, 2018.
• Ryan Holiday, “How to Serve a Deranged Tyrant, Stoically,” The Stone (New York Times blog), 02 April, 2018.
• Eric Scott, “What Political Ideas are Supported by Stoic Philosophy?,” Euthyphroria (blog), 04 July, 2018.

Economics

• Massimo Pigliucci, “Stoic Advice Column: Should I Worry about A.I. and Automation?,” How to Be a Stoic (blog), 24 February, 2017.
• Paul Meany, “How Marcus Aurelius Influenced Adam Smith (No, Really),” Foundation for Economic Education, 02 March, 2018.
• Charles Rathmann, “The Stoic Capitalist: Can We Pursue both Virtue and Profit?,” LinkedIn (blog), 05 March, 2018.

Refugees, Immigration, and Nationality

• Goldin, Owen. “Conflict and Cosmopolitanism in Plato and the Stoics.” Apeiron (2011).
• Kevin Kennedy, “‘Barbarians at the Gates’: Stoic Responses to the Refugee Crisis,” Stoicism Today: Selected Writings II (2016), pp. 198–203.
• William O. Stephens, “Refugees, Exiles, and Stoic Cosmopolitanism,” Journal of Religion and Society, Supplement 16 (2018): 73–91.
• Massimo Pigliucci, “Immigration, Borders, and the Thorny Issue of Cosmopolitanism,” Figs in Winter (Patreon blog), 22 February, 2019.
• Massimo Pigliucci, “Martha Nussbaum on cosmopolitanism — and why I once again disagree with her,” Figs in Winter (Pateron blog), 20 January, 2020.

Activism

• Christopher Gill, “Can you be a Stoic and a political activist?,” talk at Stoicon 2016 (video here), 15 October, 2016.
• Donna Zuckerberg, “How to be a Good Classicist under a Bad Emperor,” Eidolon, 20 November, 2016
• Eric O. Scott, “Dear Sandy Grant: I’m a Stoic who Marched on Washington,” Euthyphroria (blog), 21 January, 2017.
• Sophia Shapira, “Why Stoicism is Great for Activism,” Sophia’s Virtual Stoa (blog), 05 February, 2017.
• Massimo Pigliucci, “Thoreau and civil disobedience,” Footnotes to Plato (Patreon blog), 25 March, 2019.
• Massimo Pigliucci, “How to Square the Circle: Stoicism as a Personal Philosophy vs. Issues of Social Justice,” Footnotes to Plato (Patreon blog), 10 September, 2019.

Anger in Activism

• Martha Nussbaum, Anger and Forgiveness: Resentment, Generosity, Justice (Oxford University Press, 2016).
• Eric O. Scott, “How a Stoic can Ally with Angry Birds,” Euthyphroria (blog), 24 May, 2016.
• Amia Srinivasan, “Would Politics Be Better Off Without Anger?,” The Nation, 30 November, 2016.
• Sophia Shapira, “Why Stoics Shouldn’t Tone Police,” Sophia’s Virtual Stoa (blog), 27 January, 2017.
• Marco Bronx, “On Outrage: Trump is the Obstacle and the Way,” Stoicism Today, 04 March, 2017.

Stoicism Meets the Environment and Animal Justice

• Christopher Gill, “Stoicism and the Environment,” Stoicism Today: Selected Writings II (2016), pp. 119–126.
• Leonidas Konstantakos, “Would a Stoic Save the Elephants?,” Stoicism Today: Selected Writings II (2016), pp. 127–140.
• Kai Whiting, “Stoicism and Sustainability,” Stoicism Today (blog), 18 November, 2017.
• Kai Whiting, Leonidas Konstantakos, et al., “Sustainable Development, Wellbeing and Material Consumption: A Stoic Perspective,” Sustainability 10(2), 474, 2018.
• Kai Whiting et al., “Were Neanderthals Rational? A Stoic Approach,” Humanities, 7(2), p. 39, 2018.
• Massimo Pigliucci, “Should a Modern Stoic be Vegetarian?,” Stoicism Today (blog), 14 July, 2018.
• Kai Whiting, “The Sustainable Stoic: Does Modern Stoicism Call us to Be Vegetarian?,” Eidolon, 11 February, 2019.
• Chris Gill and Gabriele Galluzzo, “Stoicism, Aristotle and Environmental Responsibility,” Stoicism Today (blog), 21 December, 2019.
• Aldo Dinucci, “Greta Thunberg and Epictetian Communitarian Action,” Stoicism Today (blog), 25 April, 2020.

Stoicism Meets Social Justice and Intersectionality

• Massimo Pigliucci, “Stoicism and Social Justice,” How to Be a Stoic (blog), 25 October, 2016.
• Eric Scott, “Stoics Do Care about Social Justice: A Response to Irvine,” Stoicism Today, 29 October, 2016.
• Jules Evans, “How the alt-right emerged from men’s self-help,” Philosophy for Life and other Dangerous Situations (blog), 18 November, 2016.
• Bill Irvine, “Insult Pacifism: A Reply to Eric O. Scott,” Stoicism Today, 19 November, 2016.
• Sophia Shapira, “Epictetus Shows us How to Stand Up to Hate Speech Without Compromising our Resilience to Insults,” Sophia’s Virtual Stoa (blog), 15 June, 2017.
• Donald Robertson, “Stoicism, Insults, and Political Correctness,” Stoic Resilience Blog, 15 June, 2017.
• Chris Fisher, “What is Important in Life? Day 5,” Stoicism on Fire (podcast), 19 July, 2018.

Racial Justice

• Matt van Natta, “A Stoic Protesting wit Black Lives Matter,” The Immoderate Stoic (blog), 10 July, 2016.
• Massimo Pigliucci, “Stoic Q&A: What About Slavery?,” How to Be a Stoic (blog), 19 October, 2017.
• Donald Robertson, “Did Stoicism Condemn Slavery?,” How to Think Like a Roman Emperor (blog),  25 November, 2017.

Feminism

• David Engel, “The Gender Egalitarianism of Musonius Rufus,” Ancient Philosophy, 20:377–391, 2000.
• Scott Aikin and Emily McGill-Rutherford, “Stoicism, feminism and autonomy,” Symposion, 1(1):9–22, 2014.
• Vadim Korkhov, “The Red Band: A Stoic Criticism of the Red Pill,” Stoicism Today (blog), 06 January, 2018.
• Anitra, “Why Women Should Explore Stoicism,” A Stoic Remedy (blog), 29 January, 2018.
• Massimo Pigliucci, “The ethics of the family in Seneca, I: model mothers,” How to Be a Stoic (blog), 23 April, 2018.
• Massimo Pigliucci, “The ethics of the family in Seneca, III: the mystery of marriage,” How to Be a Stoic (blog), 14 May, 2018.
• Massimo Pigliucci, “Were the ancient Stoics feminist? Should the modern ones be?,” How to Be a Stoic (blog), 29 June, 2018.
• Donna Zuckerberg, Not All Dead White Men: Classics and Misogyny in the Digital Age (Harvard University Press, 2018).
• Anitra Pavlico, Natasha Brown, and Brittany Polat, “Online Symposium – Women and Stoicism (part 1),” Stoicism Today (blog), 16 February, 2019.
• Meredith Kunz and Kathryn Koromilas, “Online Symposium – Women and Stoicism (part 2),” Stoicism Today (blog), 23 March, 2019.
• Liz Gloyn, Debbie Joffe Ellis, and Andi Sciacca, “Online Symposium – Women and Stoicism (part 3),” Stoicism Today (blog), 22 June, 2019.
• Matt Van Natta, “Stoicism and Feminism,” The Immoderate Stoic (blog), 03 March, 2019.

Sexual Harassment

• Maureen Dowd, “She’s 26, and Brought Down Uber’s C.E.O. What’s Next?,” The New York Times Style, 21 October, 2017.
• Massimo Pigliucci, “Susan Fowler as a modern Stoic role model,” How to Be a Stoic (blog), 10 April, 2018.

Gender Identity

• Massimo Pigliucci, “Stoic Advice: Gender Identity,” How to Be a Stoic (blog), 17 March, 2017.
• Sophia Shapira, “The Stoic Community’s Understanding of Transgender Issues Still has Ways to Go,” Sophia’s Virtual Stoa (blog), 01 June, 2017.
• Massimo Pigliucci, “Stoic Advice Column: Gender Pronouns,” How to Be a Stoic (blog), 03 July, 2017.
• Massimo Pigliucci, “Stoic advice: am I transgender? And what do I do about it?,” How to Be a Stoic (blog), 04 August, 2017.

Social Insights from Other Schools

• Jules Evans, “What’s the next big idea? Neo-Aristotelianism,” Philosophy for Life and Other Dangerous Situations (blog), 23 May, 2012.
• Jeffrey Edward Green, “Solace for the Frustrations of Silent Citizenship: the Case of Epicureanism,” Citizenship Studies, 19:5, 27 October, 2015.
• Michael Welton, “Can Buddhism Save the World?,” CounterPunch Magazine, 15 January, 2016.
• Peter Singer (with responses from others), “The Logic of Effective Altruism,” The Boston Review, 06 July, 2016.
• Bin Song, “Today Ruism (Confucianism) Can Unconditionally Support Same-Sex Marriage,” HuffPost Contributor (blog), 30 December, 2017.
• Stephen Angle, Stephen. “The Future of Confucian Political Philosophy,” Comparative Philosophy 9(1), January 2, 2018.
• Umair Haque, “Eudaimonics: The Art of Realizing Genuinely Good Lives,” Eudaimonia & Co. (blog), 17 September, 2018.
• Brittany Polat, “Ethical Development in Stoicism and Confucianism,” Stoicism Today (blog), 14 September, 2019.

Critics of Stoicism: Does it encourage Do-Nothingism?

• Isaiah Berlin, Two Concepts of Liberty, 1958.
• Hiram Crespo, “Reasonings about Philodemus’ On Anger,” Society of Friends of Epicurus (blog), 29 April 2015.
• Skye Cleary, “Philosophy in Dark Times: Conversation with Sandy Grant,” Blog of the APA, 13 December, 2016.
• Scott Aikin and Robert Talisse, “Stoicism for Dark Days,” 3 Quarks Daily (blog), 02 January, 2017.
• Sandy Grant, “Forget Stoicism—a leading philosopher explains why we shouldn’t try to control our emotions,” Quartz, 18 January, 2017.
• Krista K. Thomason, “Review of “Anger and Forgiveness: Resentment, Generosity, Justice,” Essays in Philosophy 18(1): 12, 31 January, 2017.
• Karl Seigfried, “A Better Burden: Towards a New Ásatrú Theology,” The Norse Mythology Blog, 12 October, 2017.
• Robert Zaretsky, “Almost Too Sober: On the Appeal of Stoicism,” The Los Angeles Review of Books, 30 October, 2018.

Replies to Critics

• Massimo Pigliucci, “Who’s Afraid of Stoicism?,” How to Be a Stoic (blog), 22 December, 2016.
• Eric O. Scott, “Dear Sandy Grant: I’m a Stoic who Marched on Washington,” Euthyphroria (blog), 21 January, 2017.
• Massimo Pigliucci, “Virtue Ethics is a Big Tent: a Response to Edith Hall,” How to Be a Stoic (blog), 11 June, 2018.
• Eric O. Scott, “When the Stoics Make a Bad First Impression,” Euthyphroria (blog), 20 October, 2018.
• Massimo Pigliucci, “There is no Darkness in Stoicism,” Footnotes to Plato (Patreon blog), 06 November, 2018.
• Massimo Pigliucci, “What Don’t You Get about ‘Do Your Best?,'” Footnotes to Plato (Patreon blog), 26 December, 2018.
• Massimo Pigliucci, “Stoicism, Friendship, and Grief,” Footnotes to Plato (Patreon blog), 29 March, 2019.