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    Gates of Fire: An Epic Novel of the Battle of Thermopylae
    Gates of Fire: An Epic Novel of the Battle of Thermopylae
    Gates of Fire: An Epic Novel of the Battle of Thermopylae
    Audiobook14 hours

    Gates of Fire: An Epic Novel of the Battle of Thermopylae

    Written by Steven Pressfield

    Narrated by George Guidall

    4.5/5

    ()

    About this audiobook

    Gates of Fire puts you at the side of valiant Spartan warriors in 480 BC for the bloody, climactic battle at Thermopylae. There, a few hundred of Sparta's finest sacrificed their lives to hold back the invading Persian millions. The time they bought enabled the Greeks to rally-saving, according to ancient historian Herodotus, "Western democracy and freedom from perishing in the cradle." How did the Spartans accomplish this superhuman feat? This is what the King of Persia hopes to learn from the sole Spartan survivor. The squire's story indeed reveals the incredible rigors of Spartan training-and more importantly, how the whole culture fostered the mindset of fearlessness. Steven Pressfield has skillfully combined scholarship and storytelling to bring the whole world of ancient Sparta brilliantly to life. George Guidall's dramatic delivery enhances the richness and feeling of this inspired recreation.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherRecorded Books, Inc.
    Release dateFeb 17, 2012
    ISBN9781464034077
    Gates of Fire: An Epic Novel of the Battle of Thermopylae
    Author

    Steven Pressfield

    Steven Pressfield has been an enthusiastic golfer since the age of ten. He is the author of the novel Gates of Fire and a well-known screenwriter whose screenplays include "Above the Law" and "Freejack." He lives in the Los Angeles area.

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    Reviews for Gates of Fire

    4.5/5

    914 ratings58 reviews

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    • 5/5
      One of the best books I’ve ever read on the Spartans
    • 5/5
      I have read and listened to this book 6-10 time now and it never gets old!!!
    • 5/5
      Damn good book. Narration is awesome. Will listen to it again
    • 5/5
      My first fiction from Pressfield. I will be reading all of the others now. Great story
    • 5/5
      Such an incredible audiobook. The story, told in such epic fashion, takes you back in time and places you deep into the life and the minds of these unforgettable hero’s and heroines who lived through some of the most difficult trials and sacrifices imaginable.
    • 5/5
      This book is essential reading for fans of military history but can be appreciated by just about anyone who enjoys a good period drama. The story is so much more than an account of the battle. The characters are deeply developed and their individual stories are craftily interwoven.

      Even if you have read the book, I highly recommend listening to the audiobook. The narration adds so much to the story. I think it may be the best way to enjoy the story. Even if they made a movie of this book (which was almost done) I don’t think it would be as good as the audio book narration.

      For the last three weeks I actually looked forward to my commute. Thanks to this engaging tale I was not in Chicago traffic, for that time I was engaged in the business of the Spartans preparing for the inevitable Persian invasion.
    • 5/5
      This is, without question, the greatest book I have ever read. It speaks to our highest selves and our noblest virtues. In a world where our morals are crumbling and selfishness abounds, this book is a beacon of sacrifice, selflessness, and love. This book came out in 1999, and I immediately bought a copy and read it. I have re-read the book once a year since then, 22 times, and it still gives me chills. Please read this book.
    • 5/5
      Impeccable. Narration was fantastic. Pressfield's Gates of Fire is an absolute must read/listen for every man.
    • 4/5
      Really fascinating novel of the Spartans and other Greeks and the last stand of the 300 at the narrow pass of Thermopylae in the late 400s BC in their fight against the Persians and allies of Xerxes. Offers good insight into their training, philosophy, and virtues of brotherhood, honor, etc. Some foul language and very bloody fighting could be a drawback for some readers. I would definitely read it again.
    • 4/5
      A novelization of the Battle of Thermopylae, with an extensive fictional background for the main character. Yeah. So. I read about half and skimmed the rest. Not my jam. My two big issues with it: 1) It's way too graphic and violent for me, which, admittedly, is very much an "it's not you, it's me" thing, because of course a novel about Spartan soldiers and the battle in which nearly every single Greek soldier was killed is going to be violent if it's going to be accurate. But, again, that's not my jam. And 2) Pressfield clearly did his research and good for him, but he seems intent on his readers being constantly aware that he did his research. There is *way* too much detailed explanation of how the Spartans trained their army and the mechanics of the army itself, which is of course fascinating, but belongs in a history text and not a novel. Do the research, yes, and definitely use that research to help you write an accurate and believable story, but please don't regurgitate all that research onto the page. Possibly it was more annoying for me as a Classicist who already knows all the historic details? But I suspect that others would get pulled out of the story by the sheer volume of the stuff, too. The big take-away here: Pressfield is no Madeline Miller (and now I *need* Miller to write a novel about Leonidas).
    • 2/5
      To be fair, this book is exactly what the title sells it as. But it is nothing more than that. It is basically one long Brandon Sanderson fight scene. Epic? Maybe, but self-consciously epic, unbelievably epic; and therefore I found it powerless. And the writing is terrible. "The more miserable the conditions, the more convulsing the jokes become, or at least that's how it seems. I have witnessed venerable Peers of fifty years or more, with thick gray in their beards and countenances as distinguished as Zeus', dropping helpless with mirth onto hands and knees, toppling onto their backs and practically pissing down their legs they were laughing so hard. Once on an errand I saw Leonidas himself, unable to get to his feet for a minute or more, so doubled over was he from some otherwise untranslatable wisecrack." Good thing the joke was untranslatable, because otherwise Pressfield might have had to write it, and dialog is beyond him.
    • 5/5
      Great story of heroism based upon the ancient battle. The remarkable culture and standards of behavior in the Spartan nation are the highlight of this one. Should be mandatory reading for teenagers - boys in particular, but the surprise at the end is in the particular strength of the women of Sparta.
    • 4/5
      I saw 300; I’ve even read Frank Miller’s graphic novel that inspired the movie, so I wasn’t completely unprepared when I was handed a copy of Gates of Fire and told, “This is one of my favorite books. You have to read it.” Though historical fiction isn’t normally my cup of tea, especially when its main characters are warriors and its main plot is a bloody battle wherein (SPOILER ALERT) they all die, I gave it a try.The story is that of the battle of Thermopylae, otherwise known as the Hot Gates, a conflict between the invading Persian armies of King Xerxes and the defending Greeks who decided that the Hot Gates were the best place to die the best place to attempt to hold back the masses of Persians and their slaves who are in love with the idea of world domination. In order to better understand the Greeks, especially the Spartans, Xerxes has the one survivor of the battle, a dying slave to the Spartans named Xeones, tell them everything he knows about the Spartans.Of course, it’s not that simple, otherwise the book would be about fifty pages long and would end most likely on the down note of Xeones getting put out of his misery after telling all. Instead, it starts when Xeones was a child, living happily, and his town gets sacked by some other Greeks, but he escapes to eventually wind up as a slave-squire to one of the Spartans who gets sent to Thermopylae as one of the three hundred.Well, not actually as one of the three hundred. I mean, he is a squire to one of the Official Three Hundred Spartans, but it’s not like they were the only warriors to show up.You see, part of what makes Gates of Fire a fantastic book is that Pressfield has a penchant for research, so much of what made it into the book is actually historically true and you end up actually learning something (which is another reason why I don’t normally read historical fiction--who needs stealth learning? My gosh).What I mostly learned about the three hundred is that there was actually a bit more than three hundred people from Sparta showing up at the Hot Gates. There were three hundred actual, true Spartan citizens and then eleventy billion slaves-of-the-Spartans (okay, like a thousand, maybe) who showed up to be squires and blacksmiths and the like.There were also Greeks from other city-states like Athens and Corinth and Mycenae hanging around waiting to get slaughtered...I mean...beat back the Persians. Granted, most of those are sent home by the Spartans at the end of the battle so they don’t get killed, but it’s still a bit of a misnomer to say “Only the three hundred Spartans held back Xerxes!”So, if you’re interested in a compelling, well-written book in which you might actually learn a few historical facts, put this one on your to-read list.
    • 3/5
      This is a fictional account of the battle at Thermopile. One thing I learned is that there were many more than 300 Spartan combatants on the defensive side. Thousands actually, but only 300 elite soldiers who were ultimately the only ones required to stand and die to allow the homeland to prepare for the Persian onslaught. Sometimes gripping narrative, with very brutal battle descriptions and modern day English vulgar language at times. It's one of those books that makes you wonder, "how close is this description to what really happened?"
    • 2/5
      I'm ashamed to admit I couldn't finish this. This is the military novel to end all military novels, I know. And Pressfield certainly knows his stuff, and he writes better than competently—in fact I'd go so far as to say he writes poetically, in the best sense. Maybe it's because I've read a good deal of military writing, fiction and non-fiction; or, conversely, maybe it's because I've never served in the military; but I found the theme of the book too tired, too well-trodden, and the novelty of the setting and the lyricism of the writing weren't enough to make up for it. Battle forges blood-sealed bonds between fighting men—men of different backgrounds, different abilities, unified by necessity. That theme has been explored over and over again by every chronicler of war since Homer. And honestly I didn't care for any of these characters enough for it to matter. Also I rolled my eyes when the main female character was raped within the first few chapters. Of course the male main character faces a unique and striking challenge: he wants to be a spearman, but he loses the use of his hand—a great opportunity for character development. What happens to the female to spur her growth as a character? Oh, she gets raped. Old and tired and offensive, not just because it's misogynistic but because it's lazy.

      May try again at some point, just because I want to say truthfully that I've read this.
    • 4/5
      There's not much I can say about the book that hasn't been covered by others and even the cover itself. The book centers upon the Battle of Thermopylae, the same subject as the movie 300, but chok full of so much more. If you want to get an immersion into the mindset and culture of these amazing warriors, then this is the book to read. My only critique is flow. There's a lot of back and forth, which interrupts the pacing. From the start to halfway it is not a bother because Pressfield is impeccable with creating evocative images; however, after a third of the way through it began to wear on me. If it wasn't for the pacing issue I'd rate it a 5.
    • 3/5
      Years ago, a man walked into my bookstore and ordered 20 copies of this book because he liked it so much he needed to give a copy to everyone he knew. A couple years ago, it came up again when a coworker passionately explained that it was one of his most favorite books of all time. I decided that any novel that inspired that much fervor was probably worth reading.It was very good, but not really my thing. A captured, nearly-dead survivor of the battle of Thermopylae recounts his personal history and the training regiment of the Spartan warriors he served, and who were lately defeated by the Persian army. Much historical research likely went into the details of the Spartan day, the different levels of the Spartan boys as they progressed up to Peer status, the slave-servants and their role in their lives, and just how much punishment they subjected themselves to.The most vivid scene for me was the description of the aftermath of the ill-matched battle on the first day. One Spartan took of his helmet and all his hair came with it. Another spit out a mouthful of teeth. All collapsed into the slimy mess of the battlefield, where the soil had been churned up calf-deep by fierce fighting and was made into a sludgy mess by the amount of blood that had been spilled.It is well-written, touching, and definitely an ode to the single-minded soldiering of the Spartan army. I can see how this would appeal to, and be inspirational to, many people, but again, it just wasn't my thing.
    • 2/5
      This turned out to not be my sort of thing. There is a perfectly understandable need to set the scene for the climactic battle, but with one thing and another, I never read far enough to get anywhere near it. The early part of the book is a set of slightly confusing flashbacks and switches of perspective, introducing the protagonist, a young lad who will become a squire and the only surviving non-Persian witness to the battle. I found it rather difficult to follow his mental switches between points in his life. When we did settle down to an account of how he ended up at Thermopylae, it was a grim litany of unpleasant events. As tends to happen, it was the compulsory Historical Novel Rape Scene that first disengaged me - his cousin is barely introduced to the book before she's gang-raped by a band of pillaging Persians. I did press on for a while, but on that kind of form, I just didn't anticipate enjoying it very much. The book would need to be more tightly-written and more compelling to draw me on despite the content. Reading other reviews, it seems that the actual battle doesn't even start until near the end of the book, so I'm not sorry I stopped. I don't see much entertainment value in a couple of hundred pages of brutality and misery, personally.
    • 4/5
      Ah, Memphis; home of Elvis and the Ancient Greeks...erm...

      Most people who know anything about anything, know at least a little about the legend of Thermopylae and the 300 Spartans who fought there against overwhelming Persian odds back in the time of Ancient Greece. Of course, if you've seen the film '300', you'll know roughly the story, but 'Gates of Fire' takes it on to a whole different level.

      'Gates of Fire' (Thermopylae is Greek for 'hot gates', after the hot springs found there) uses what is known of the battle, immediately before, during and immediately after, and fleshes out the available facts, with background, characters and lots of personality. Having already read 'The Spartans', by Paul Cartledge, I knew something of The Spartan's history and traditions beforehand, so I can vouch for the authenticity of the description of Spartan society, customs and fighting techniques.

      It's written as though one of the Greeks has survived and though gravely injured, is telling the story of the Spartans and their preparation for and conduct during the battle, for later presentation to the Persian king Xerxes.

      It is a thoroughly captivating book, well-written and packed with detail and interesting characters. The book builds nicely throughout, leading to the climactic battle at the pass of the hot springs. The description of the fight scenes in the final battle is superb, gripping and well-written. Of course, I've no experience of fighting in such a battle, but it seems very realistic, you get what seems like much more of an idea of how - apart from anything, how dirty and thoroughly exhausting - it must have been to take part in such a battle, than many of the other historical novels I've read.
      I thought it was a really good, thoroughly enjoyable, absorbing read.

      *Of course, there weren't only 300 Spartans fighting at Thermopylae. There were thousands of other Greeks from other Greek city states in the battle as well. Even the 300 Spartans is a little doubtful. In The Gates of Fire, does say that 300 are chosen to go to the battle. On the third day of fighting, the Spartan king Leonidas, on learning that his force is about to be surrounded, by Persians coming round to the rear of the Thermopylae pass, sends away the majority of the other Greek forces. Some refuse and so stay, but in this book, obviously at this point, there are a lot less than 300 Spartans still alive. However, some other sources suggest that over 1,000 Spartans went to start the battle and that when Leonidas sent away the Greek forces, there were just 300 Spartans left at that point. Confusing.
    • 5/5
      What a book! A timeless masterpiece. All I can say is I wish it had been at least twice as long, or even infinite, for that matter. Legendary! I highly recommend this!
    • 3/5
      "Gates of Fire" is a majestic novel focused on the actions of 300 Spartans defending Hellas from the vast invading Persian hordes. It's story is large, the characters heroic. It's not, however, epic. At least not in its claustrophobic feel. The epic-ness resides in the well-travelled deeds of the Spartans then, just not in this book.Honor is a most valued trait. Long Homeric speeches bolster mens' bravery. And within this glory-driven, very testosterone-heavy vibe, we see only glimpses of the humanness of somewhat two-dimensional characters who represent the greater collective of the Spartan spirit. The Spartan women seem to best represent the humanness of this group of people who've taken on a supernatural historic status. They are noble, strong in both emotions and physicality, but through them we glimpse the human soul that resides at the heart of Pressfield's story. This story did not touch me. The characters and themes did not connect with me as a reader. Maybe because I'm not a warrior? Maybe because I'm not as familiar with this time period? I don't think so. This beautifully written novel is well crafted, but there's a flatness in the characterizations, and in the cases where a third dimension is almost complete, Pressfield shifts time and focus and delves into another aspect of Sparta's war-heavy ways. The battle scenes are tremendous and Pressfield does a terrific job of varying the action and description. I recommend "Gates of Fire" for the action and the story. Just don't go looking for more.
    • 4/5
      First line:~ Although extraordinary valor was displayed by the entire corps of Spartans and Thespaians, yet bravest of all was declared the Spartan Dienekes ~My 29 year old son is a great fan of historical fiction involving battles and war strategy etc. He says that Gates of Fire is the best that he has ever read. I tried it once before and couldn't get into it but I know from past experience that sometimes a second go around makes the difference. This time I made it to the end.This is definitely not my favourite book but it is obviously well researched, well written and very detailed. Pressfield did some pretty heavy research about the Spartans and their warfare tactics. I understand it is pretty accurate. There are long passages (pages and pages) of details of the training experiences and the actual battle strategies etc. If you want bloody detail about hand to hand combat this is the book for you. I did find it fascinating to see what a well oiled machine these legions presented to their enemies and their sheer determination is to be admired on a certain level. However, reading this just confirms for me the tragedy of war. I can't imagine the life that these men and their squires lead. I am taken by their discipline and commitment. However, I am saddened as I am any time that I read about war and, what I believe to be, the senseless loss of lives. And so many lives were lost at this battle.There is also a lot of information about Spartan women and the role they play in the unfolding war.I don't think I would read this again but I did enjoy it.
    • 4/5
      This book was a very intimate look at the culture and lives of the Spartan 300 warriors. I found this book well worth reading. It kept you very much involved, and provided just enough humanity to the tale that you begin to care about the characters. This book focuses more on the historical than the fictional, even though it is a fictional view. It is actually a bit hard to read emotionally, since the Spartan lifestyle, and later the battle portrayals, are hard to imagine in today's society, and to our modern world can actually seem quite barbaric. This is not light reading, though the writing style is comfortable and engaging. My overall impression is of a very good inside look at a horrific battle. I enjoyed the read.
    • 4/5
      A little too disjointed and long-winded for my taste.
    • 5/5
      It took a rare individual to write this masterpiece of historical fiction. First, only a highly skilled writer could craft such a compelling, readable book. Second, he had to be intimately familiar with classical Greek history and the extant sources for the period. Finally, and most important, only someone who has endured the blood, sweat, and tears of military training and combat could create this timeless, relevant story.This book is an account of the same events at Thermopylae as the graphic novel, and now movie, 300. Both are good stories, but 300 is almost completely without context. When I first saw the movie, I left impressed, but thinking others who didn't have any background in classical Greek history were left with the wrong impression of Sparta. Gates of Fire tells the whole story, warts and all.Two constant themes in the book are camaraderie between warriors, and to a lesser extent, citizenship. He explores both ideas from different perspectives through dialogue between various characters, and their relations as Spartans, slaves, and other free Greeks. The central truth, gradually explained throughout the book, is that the opposite of fear is love.Some reviewers thought there was too much profanity and crude sexual jokes. He actually kept it pretty mild in my experience. I try to refrain from swearing and vulgar jokes myself, but it's a fact of life in military service. That's part of what makes the book realistic, and instantly relatable for any veteran. His realistic portrayal of military life and close combat are needed in stories of this kind. He neither glorifies war, nor condemns it in some quixotic quest for a fantasy world without war.Few books or movies manage to successfully tread this narrow path. One notable example is the brilliant movie Blackhawk Down, by Ridley Scott (before he made a preachy, anachronistic, and historically inaccurate movie about the Crusades). These works of art skillful communicate the sentiment in the quote attributed to General Robert E Lee: "It is well that war is so terrible, otherwise we should grow too fond of it."
    • 5/5
      It took a while for me to get into this story, but I did love the novel by the end. The story is framed as the first person account of a "squire" of the heavy infantry of the famous 300 of Sparta at Thermophylae, where in 480 BC a few thousand Greeks held off hundreds of thousands of invading Persians for days. Xeones tells his story to the Persians because he doesn't want his comrades who fell there and what they did to be forgotten.Xeones, only twenty at the time of the battle, was made stateless at ten when his city fell to fellow Greeks, the Argives who were Sparta's tradition enemy. Making his way to Sparta and choosing to fix his loyalty there, he is made a servant to one of the Spartan officers, Dienekes, who'll fight at Thermophylae. The portrait of Sparta fascinated beyond that of simply military fiction because this isn't really a book about the battle, but what it is that within the Spartans, and within humans, that makes deeds like theirs possible. Sparta was the main model for Plato's utopia in The Republic, and the training was famously harsh. Pressfield's Spartans, although brutal by modern standards, aren't brutes though. As he presents them there is no sadism in how they train their soldiers, but an attempt to habituate them to pain and hardship and drive away instinctive fear, so that they can perform "the commonplace" drilled into them in "uncommonplace conditions" of battle. Xeones greatly admires his master Dienekes, who is presented as a Spartan ideal even above Polynikes who embodies so much of the martial virtues. As Pressfield presents Dienekes, he's not an Achilles who single-handedly slays myriads, but a professional "whose primary attribute was self-restraint and self-composure" and it's this rather than bloodlust or even glory (Polynikes' ideal) that Pressfield presents as at the core of the Spartans martial success. Throughout his life, Dienekes has made his study the question, "What is the opposite of fear?" It's the answer he reaches at Thermophylae I found among the most moving moments in the novel. At the same time, Pressfield doesn't airbrush out Sparta is essentially a police state, with systematic eugenic infanticide, informers, assassins for dissenters, and that its citizens have only one profession from the moment they are sent for training as young boys at seven-years-old until 60 years of age--war. Within a slave society even its citizens are essentially slaves. Xeones young friend Alexandros, a Spartan "peer," is more suited to be a musician than a soldier and feels a distaste for war--but he has no other options. Given that King Leonidas speeches about the need to fight for "liberty" against the Persians felt a bit hollow to me. The novel does soft-petal just how badly treated the helots, the state slaves were. In addition, from what I've read about Sparta, the mentoring system was a form of institutionalized pederasty in Sparta--someone like Dienekes wouldn't just be Alexandros mentor, but his lover. Nothing like that is hinted in the book. Despite that, I can't help but feel admiration for Pressfield's Spartans and care about his characters. Leonidas himself is written as an able leader. Like another reviewer of the book, I'm more impressed by the achievements of Athens than Sparta. But it's because of Sparta's part in the Persian war that Athens survived to bequeath to us the cornerstones of Western civilization. Reading Pressfield I'm reminded of the quote attributed to Orwell--that we only sleep safe in our beds because "rough men stand ready to visit violence on those who would harm us." Pressfield wrote a more thoughtful book than I expected, true to the emotions and experiences of military training and war from what I've read of it and heard of it from veterans. This raises it well above the visually spectacular graphic novel and film on Thermopylae, The 300. Pressfield's battle scenes are vivid and seem real because of how he conveys things like the emotional and physical exhaustion. And despite this being essentially a work of military fiction about a warrior society, I thought Pressfield did a good job with his female characters and historically Sparta was, in terms of gender, the most egalitarian of the Ancient Greek city-states, so his strong female characters are fitting. He certainly does well by those who are buried near the memorial at Thermophylae with the famous epigram: "Tell the Spartans, stranger passing by, that here obedient to their laws we lie."
    • 5/5
      Like many people, I imagine, going into this book I have already seen the movie 300, so I know the general story. The only problem with this is that I continuously compared it to that work. That is a shame because they are greatly different stories. Gates of Fire is mostly narrated by one Spartan squire, Xeones, who had been saved by the royal surgeons of the emperor Xerxes. He not only tells the story of the battle at Thermopylae, but the majority of his own history. How he grew up away from the Spartan's home of Lakedaemon in another city, and how the landscape was continuously scarred with war. He and his cousin escaped his own city being destroyed and they eventually went their separate ways. She to Athens and he to Sparta. He gradually rose through the ranks starting as a slave of sorts until he was a squire to one of the heroes of the Spartan army, Dienekes. The narration account much more of the training methods and culture of the Spartan people than of war itself. He does eventually get to the battle of Thermopylae, but if you are expecting a book filled with gruesome detail and action, you may want to look elsewhere. Not to say there aren't those aspects as well.The author does a great job of characterization so that the reader actually cares what happens to the characters. This makes it that much more tragic when all the characters die in the end. This shouldn't come as any surprise to anyone, as I think the general story line is fairly known. Once the story progresses to the main battle, it becomes one of the best page turners I have ever read. It was both tragic and very exciting.Throughout much of the book I had to remind myself that it is a work of fiction and not a historical work. Not to say that it was dry and filled with dates and other factual information, but it was obvious that Pressfield did a massive amount of research for the novel. The book is interspersed with so much Greek words that I often had difficulty pronouncing a line. This combined with the great detail into how they battled and trained really made the fictional account of the novel that much more real.I can't recommend this book highly enough, both for lovers of war books but also for those that just love a good story and good characters. 5 of 5 stars!
    • 5/5
      This story puts you back into history, into a very intense culture that reminds you how how easy we have it in many ways. Great story - could not put it down. I wish my history teachers had used this kind of material.
    • 5/5
      Well read and extremely well-written. A delight to listen to, and painful to come to the end because one is so interested in the times and so sympathetic to the well-developed characters.Pressfield even surpasses the Shaaras, in my opinion, and this is his best of the several books of his to which I have listened.
    • 3/5
      This is a more accurate depiction of the Battle of Thermopylae, the battle of Greek allied forces against the Persian Empire at Thermopylae.What got me interested in this story was the movie 300 and while I did find its interpretation of the battle entertaining I still enjoy learning about what really went on.I would only use this book in a junior high or high school classroom as it was a graphic at times. I would definitely recommend it to any students who may have seen 300 and enjoyed it and use it to aid in a unit teaching about Greek history and mythology.