Before reading this book, what did you associate with "the founding fathers"? Did anything here surprise you or complicate that picture?
Ricks says he started this project the morning after the 2016 election, trying to understand whether the country matched what the founders intended. Does knowing that origin change how you read the book?
Ricks argues Washington, Adams, Jefferson, and Madison each came to classical learning differently — Washington through elite culture rather than formal schooling, Adams through Roman law and rhetoric, Jefferson through Greek philosophy (especially Epicurus), Madison as a methodical researcher. Which of these paths to knowledge resonates most with your own experience of learning — through immersion, formal study, personal philosophy, or research?
Washington modeled himself on Cato the Younger and the Roman ideal of a citizen-soldier who serves and then steps back from power. Do we still have public figures who follow that model, or has that ideal disappeared?
Adams idolized Cicero; Jefferson preferred the Greeks, especially Epicurus. What's the difference between someone who looks to Rome for models of duty and order versus someone who looks to Greece for models of liberty and personal happiness? Which pull do you feel more?
The book emphasizes that for this generation, "silent virtue" was valued over "loud eloquence" — the opposite of today's culture. What would it look like to practice a quieter kind of virtue now, and is that even possible in an age of social media and constant self-promotion?
Several reviewers note the founders' classical education was as much about training character as training the mind. Is there a modern equivalent to that kind of education, or has education become purely about skills and credentials?
Ricks doesn't shy away from the contradictions — men steeped in ideals of liberty who also owned slaves, or who cited Aristotle to justify hierarchy. How should a book discussion group hold both admiration and criticism of historical figures at once?
One reviewer felt Ricks judged the founders too much through a modern lens; another found the book "instructive" precisely because it holds them accountable. Where do you come down — should we judge historical figures by the standards of their time, ours, or both?
Ricks asks: if classical culture once gave Americans a shared vocabulary and shared standard for judging leaders, what serves that function today? Money? Celebrity? Political tribalism? Nothing at all?
The book traces how "American classicism" faded as the nation democratized and specialized. Was something valuable lost when a shared body of ancient texts stopped being common cultural ground — or was that inevitable and even healthy?
If you were the founders' generation, what body of stories, philosophy, or history would you have wanted your fellow citizens to know by heart, in order to hold the country together?