"'Seek another kingdom, my son. Macedon is too small for you.' There was great pride in these words of Philip, King of Macedon. Only a moment before, his son Alexander - he who was to be called the 'Great' - had tamed the wild colt Bucephalus. Philip's prophecy came to pass not many years after when Alexander left Macedon on a march of conquest and cruelty that took him through Persia, Egypt, and eastward into India. What strange purpose prompted this adventure - one of the longest marches of its kind ever recorded? Some say that Alexander dreamed of uniting all people under a single government. Others believe that he was possessed by an insane desire for conquest and power. Still others suggest that he longed to spread the learning and culture of Greece into every known land.

John Gunther answers the question by giving us vivid pictures of Alexander's character and of the people who influenced his earlier years. His mother, Olympias, a strong-willed and ambitious woman, stopped at nothing to get what she wanted. The rough soldier who was King of Macedon and Alexander's father had set a pattern of conquest for his son to follow. The philosopher Aristotle, Alexander's teacher, gave the boy his deep love for Greek learning. Although Alexander the Great lived twenty-three centuries ago, this detailed account of his life is written with such vigor and color that the man and this times emerge with startling freshness and clarity