In the real world, Sokrates did not accompany the Athenians’ expedition to Sicily in 415 B. C. E. As told in the story, Alkibiades’ political foes in Athens did arrange his recall. In real history, he left the expedition but fled on the way to Athens. He eventually wound up in Sparta, the Athenians’ bitter foe in the Peloponnesian War, and advised the Spartans to aid Syracuse and to continue the war against Athens. (He also, incidentally, fathered a bastard on King Agis’ wife, whose bed Agis was avoiding due to religious scruples.)
The Athenian expedition, despite substantial reinforcements in 413 B. C. E., was a disastrous failure. It did not take Syracuse, and few of the approximately 50,000 hoplites and sailors sent west ever saw Athens again. Nikias, who headed the force after Alkibiades’ recall, was executed by the Syracusans. Alkibiades returned to the Athenian side, then abandoned Athens’ cause after further political strife and was murdered in 404 B. C. E. In that same year, the Spartans decisively defeated the Athenians and, at a crushing cost, won the Peloponnesian War.
In the aftermath of the war, Sokrates’ pupil Kritias became the head of the Thirty Tyrants, and was killed during the civil war leading to the restoration of Athenian democracy in 403 B. C. E. Sokrates himself, convicted on a charge of bringing new gods to Athens, drank hemlock in 399 B. C. E., refusing to flee, though many might have wished he would have gone into exile instead. His pupil Aristokles-far more often known as Platon because of his broad shoulders-survived for more than half a century; it is through the writings of Platon, Xenophon, and Aristophanes that we know Sokrates, who himself left nothing in writing.
In real history, the assault on Persia waited until the reign of Alexander the Great (336–323 B. C. E.), and occurred under Macedonian domination, not that of the Hellenic poleis.
Harry Turtledove was born in Los Angeles in 1949. After flunking out of Caltech, he earned a Ph. D. in Byzantine history from UCLA. He has taught ancient and medieval history at UCLA, Cal State Fullerton, and Cal State L.A., and has published a translation of a ninth-century Byzantine chronicle and several scholarly articles. He is, however, primarily a full-time science fiction and fantasy writer; much of his work involves either alternate histories or historically based fantasy.
Among his science fiction are the alternate history novel The Guns of the South; and Worldwar series (an alternate history involving alien invasion during World War II); How Few Remain, a Nebula finalist; and Ruled Britannia, set largely in the theaters of Shakespeare’s London in a world where the Spanish Armada was successful.
His alternate history novella, “Down in the Bottomlands,” won the 1994 Hugo Award in its category. An alternate history novelette, “Must and Shall,” was a 1996 Hugo and 1997 Nebula finalist. The science-fiction novella “Forty, Counting Down” was a 2000 Hugo finalist, and is under option for film production.
He is married to fellow novelist Laura Frankos Turtledove. They have three daughters, Alison, Rachel, and Rebecca.