The Shape of Ancient Thought: Comparative Studies in Greek and Indian Philosophies

Thomas McEvilley was born in Cincinnati on July 13, 1939. He received his B.A. from University of Cincinnati and his M.A. from the University of Washington. He then returned to Cincinnati, where he received a Ph.D. in classical philology. He held a strong interest in modern art, reinforced by the modern artists of his acquaintance. He was an expert in the fields of Greek and Indian culture, history of religion and philosophy, and art. He published several books (including the monumental “The Shape of Ancient Thought”) and hundreds of scholarly monographs, articles, catalog essays, and reviews on early Greek and Indian poetry, philosophy, and religion as well as on contemporary art and culture. In the lingering wake of 1960s formalist thinking dominated by Clement Greenberg and Minimalism, Mr. McEvilley was a crucial alternative voice. He was among the first widely read critics of his generation to write about contemporary non-Western art at a time when it was all but unknown to the Western market.

He received numerous awards, including the Semple Prize at the University of Cincinnati, a National Endowment for the Arts Critics grant, a Fulbright fellowship in 1993, an NEA critic’s grant, and the Frank Jewett Mather Award (1993) for Distinction in Art Criticism from the College Art Association. He was also a contributing editor of Artforum and editor in chief of Contemporanea.

McEvilley died on March 2, 2013 of complications from cancer at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center. He was 73.