How to Have Willpower

An Ancient Guide to Not Giving In

Prudentius, Michael Fontaine, Plutarch

$29.99

Hardback

Forthcoming
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English

Princeton University Pres
01 October 2025

Western philosophy: Ancient, to c 500; Ethics & moral philosophy; Self-help & personal development; Ancient Greek

Series: Ancient Wisdom for Modern Readers

Lively new translations of two classical works that offer wise advice about how to resist temptation.

How to Have Willpower brings together two profound ancient meditations on how to overcome pressures that encourage us to act against our own best interests

Plutarch's essay On Dysopia or How to Resist Pressure and Prudentius's poetic allegory Psychomachia or How to Slay Your Demons. Challenging the idea that humans are helpless victims of vice, these works

introduced and presented in vivid, accessible new prose translations by Michael Fontaine, with the original Latin and Greek texts on facing pages

emphasise the power of personal choice and the possibility of personal growth, as they offer insights and practical advice about resisting temptation.

In the spirit of the best ancient self-help writing, Plutarch, a pagan Greek philosopher and historian, offers a set of practical recommendations and steps we can take to resist pressure and to stop saying 'yes' against our better judgment. And in a delightfully different work, Prudentius, a Latin Christian poet, dramatises the necessity to actively fight temptation through the story of an epic battle within the human soul between fierce warrior women representing our virtues and vices.

Plutarch and Prudentius insist that we allow pressure or temptations to get the best of us. But they also agree that we can do something about it. And their wisdom can help.

By: Prudentius, Plutarch
Edited and translated by: Michael Fontaine
Imprint: Princeton University Pres
Country of Publication: United States [Currently unable to ship to USA: see Shipping Info]
Dimensions: Height: 171mm, Width: 114mm,
ISBN: 9780691220345
ISBN 10: 0691220344
Series: Ancient Wisdom for Modern Readers
Pages: 232
Publication Date: 01 October 2025
Audience: General/trade , ELT Advanced
Format: Hardback
Publisher's Status: Forthcoming

Michael Fontaine is professor of classics at Cornell University. His books include four other volumes in the Ancient Wisdom for Modern Readers series, How to Drink, How to Grieve, How to Tell a Joke, and How to Get Over a Breakup (all Princeton).

Reviews for How to Have Willpower: An Ancient Guide to Not Giving In

""Fascinating and so useful. . . . How To Have Willpower is an important work, perhaps Fontaine’s best, that deserves to be both studied and discussed. One hopes that it will not only reintroduce these forgotten writings of Plutarch and Prudentius to a new generation of readers, but also reignite the old debate between the merits of faith and reason.""---George Thomas, Quintus Curtius ""[A] gem.""---Jeannette Cooperman, The Common Reader