John Sellars

I joined Royal Holloway in 2017 and am currently Reader in the History of Philosophy. I am also the founder and Chair of the Centre for the Study and Application of Stoicism, working in collaboration with colleagues in Classics and Psychology. 

I am also affiliated to King’s College London, where I am Associate Editor for the Ancient Commentators on Aristotle project, and I am a member of the London Centre for Ancient Philosophy. 

I am a Member of Common Room at Wolfson College, Oxford, where I am involved in the college's Ancient World Research Cluster. 

I am a Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy. 

My research focuses in ancient philosophy and its later influence, especially in the Renaissance. In particular I work on Stoicism and its reception. 

My first book, The Art of Living: The Stoics on the Nature and Function of Philosophy (2003; 2nd edn 2009) examined the way in which Stoic philosophy was located within a broader conception of philosophy as a way of life. My second book, Stoicism (2006), was described by reviewers as ‘excellent’, ‘outstanding’, and ‘the best introduction to the subject’. A revised and updated edition has been published in 2025. My third authored book, Hellenistic Philosophy, was published by Oxford University Press in 2018. More recently I have written a monograph on Marcus Aurelius, defending his status as a serious philosopher fully committed to Stoicism. 

I have also written a number of trade books for Penguin which have been translated into multiple languages: Lessons in Stoicism (2019), The Fourfold Remedy: Epicurus and the Art of Happiness (2021), and Aristotle: Understanding the World's Greatest Philosopher (2023).  

I have edited The Routledge Handbook of the Stoic Tradition (2016), charting the influence of Stoic ideas from antiquity to the present day, and The Cambridge Companion to Marcus Aurelius' Meditations (2025). With Liz Gloyn (RHUL Classics) I have just completed editing Brill's Companion to Musonius Rufus (est. 2026). 

At the moment I am completing a monograph on the idea of philosophy as a way of life in the Renaissance, from Petrarch to Montaigne. 

For over a decade I have been involved in bringing Stoicism to a wider audience. I was one of the founding members of Modern Stoicism, the organization that runs Stoic Week and Stoicon. I am also a co-founder of The Aurelius Foundation, which promotes Stoicism in a variety of contexts, from prisons to businesses.  

For further information, visit www.johnsellars.org.uk.