Luc Brisson, CNRS
The opening of the Charmides : self-restraint in question.
The Charmides opens with the following scene. Socrates has returned the previous evening, so that we are in the winter of 429. Socrates, who is about forty years old, goes to the gymnasium of Taureas. There he meets Charmides, who is slightly older than twenty. Charmides' beauty makes Socrates weak at the knees. To seduce the beautiful young man, who had complained of headaches that very morning to Critias, Socrates declares that he knows a way to cure him: by means of a plant-based remedy and an incantation. By mastering his emotions, Socrates displays that moderation whose definition is being sought in the dialogue, and which must reign in the soul to which the incantation is addressed. The opening of the Charmides, which has great literary beauty, announces the themes that will be developed in the dialogue.
Jenny Bryan, UCL
On the openings of Plato's Parmenides and Timaeus
Scholars have long debated the implications of the apparently inconsistent metaphysical positions of Plato’s Parmenides and his Timaeus and disagreed as to their relative dating and relation to Plato’s own thought. Despite these provocative differences and disagreements, we can identify one intriguing point of similarity between the two: both begin with clear (albeit very distinct) allusions to the Republic.
This paper examines the significance of this shared opening allusion for our understanding of each dialogue, both in terms of their relation to the Republic and to one another and in terms of how the opening of each dialogue relates to what comes after. It will consider the differences in the ways that each dialogue sets up the connection with the Republic. Why does the Parmenides employ a reference to Adeimantus and Glaucon whilst the Timaeus relies on Socrates own retelling of his conversation? What should we make of the fact that the Parmenides offers an allusion that, according to the dramatic order of the dialogues, must be to a discourse which happened long before Antiphon's retelling but also due to occur some time after the conversation related between Parmenides and Socrates? How does this compare with Socrates’ reference in the Timaeus to a conversation from ‘yesterday’? Why is the reference in the Parmenides built into the framing and potentially distancing device of the retelling by Antiphon whilst it is Socrates himself who recalls the conversation in the Timaeus? The paper will also reflect on the question to what degree the opening passages of each dialogue provide a key to understanding the possible coherence of what follows and the relation between the metaphysics of the Parmenides, Timaeus and Republic. It will consider the possibility that the greater immediacy of the Timaeus’ allusion to the Republic indicates its relative superiority (in some sense) to the Parmenides.
Andrea Capra, University of Milan
Poetic beginnings and silenic closures in Plato's erotic dialogues
This paper argues that the beginnings of Plato’s Lysis, Phaedrus and Symposium, are self-consciously poetic, whereas their closures conjure up the world of satyrs. I conclude by pondering the rationale of this surprising pattern.
The Lysis opens with a poetic exchange between Hippothales and Socrates, who utter, respectively, an iambic trimeter and a funny quasi-hexameter. This curious feature has escaped the attention of modern scholars, but, arguably, it was fully grasped by Plato's contemporaries: a remarkable echo can be heard in the extant trimeters of Alexis' Phaedrus. The Symposium, in turn, displays a famously complex narrative frame, which is demonstrably modelled on the magnetic chain of poetry described in the Ion: thus, the very structure of the dialogue turns out to be poetic in essence. As for the Phaedrus, I draw attention on an early reference to the palinode motif that informs the first part of the dialogue: while walking towards the plane-tree, Phaedrus and Socrates question the myth of Oreithyia: ‘is this story true’? This foreshadows the palinode motif, as Socrates addresses Helen’s similar myth and ends up quoting Stesichorus: ‘this story isn’t true’.
The closure of the Lysis features the only violent scene in the Platonic corpus, as the drunken pedagogues break into the gymnasium. Their irruption calls to mind satyr plays as well as comedies, but contextual elements suggest that the former are a more important model. The closures of both Symposium and Phaedrus emphasize the mixture between the higher and the lower, the serious and the comic. In both cases, such a mixture, while pointing back to crucial moments of the dialogue, seems to imply a connection with Socrates’ silenic persona and with the mixed nature of Sokratikoi logoi as a genre.
Three markedly ‘poetic’ beginnings are followed by three equally ‘satyric’ closures. I conclude my paper with the suggestion that this remarkable pattern is integral to the shared subject of love: Platonic eros is ‘poetic’ as it prompts the production of logoi and is ‘satyric’ in that it combines the high and the low.
Carlotta Capuccino, University of Bologna
Paradoxical Proems: The relationship between diégesis and mímesis in Plato' s dialogues.
In their lively and complex architectures that make them unique and irreducible to one another, the proems of Plato’s dialogues are not only “paths of flowers” traced to accompany the reader to “the thorns and thistles” of metaphysical arguments, as Hegel called them. These introductory scenes are not just a literary ornament of Plato’s philosophy, but contain a clever allusion to the meaning of his dialectical writing and his authorial anonymity. Plato chose to write anonymous philosophical dialogues, so we do not ever hear his voice expressing itself on the important issues discussed by Socrates and the other characters. The thesis I would argue for is that the proems are the place where Plato has instead decided to make listen, in an allusive way, his voice not about the individual contents of his doctrine, but on the meaning and form of his written philosophy. By reinterpreting the traditional role of exordia, the Platonic proems perform the indispensable philosophical function of preserving the sense of Plato’s philosophy for the reader akin to it.
The Platonic dialogues have two different writing styles: some, like Euthyphro or Phaedrus, adopt a dramatic style, i.e. the direct exchange of words between the characters; others, such as the Republic, the narrative or indirect style, where the exchange of words is introduced by the voice of a narrator, which alternates with that of the characters. But there is a particular group of six dialogues, the so-called “mixed dialogues” (Protagoras, Euthydemus, Phaedo, Symposium, Parmenides and Theaetetus), in which the two styles alternate giving rise to a structural anomaly: the dialogue, usually tripartite in a proem, a middle part and an epilogue, appears two-headed, that is equipped with a double proem. The proem “internal” to the dialogical scene is in fact preceded by an “external” proem which sounds paradoxical because set in a place and at a time other than the place and time of the dialogue, and often between different interlocutors. They are especially these paradoxical proems, with their skilful narrative plays, which contain allusions to Plato’s thesis on what ultimately is the preferable style, between mímesis and diégesis, for a good philosophical writing.
Pierre Destrée, University of Louvain
Sex, Laughter and Philosophy in the Symposium
In this paper, I offer a new understanding of the famous, yet rather mysterious, last words of Socrates as reported by Aristodemus: “The key point was that Socrates was pressing them to agree that the same man should be capable of writing both tragedy and comedy” (223d). It is no wonder that Socrates addresses these words to Agathon and Aristophanes, but their relevance is both more specific and much broader than usually thought. Specifically, Plato wants to describe how one should read Diotima’s (tragic) speech together with Alcibiades’ (comic) speech ; and, more broadly, Plato wants to underline what he has been doing all through this dialogue – from the very first pun on Apollodorus’ demotic (172a) and the wool thread joke (175d) up to the highly funny last speech – that is using laughter as a tool to convince the symposiasts, and his readers, of one of his central, serious, philosophical points: that education in virtue is not to be conceived of as paiderastia, or more generally, as transmission of knowledge.
Michael Erler, Wuerzburg University
Argumentative aporia and dramatic euporia. The closures of and in the Protagoras and the Euthyphro
Argument and literary form, and how both relate to each other and the interrelations between both, are important aspects for any interpreter for any interpretation of the Platonic dialogues, because Plato, the author, and Plato, the philosopher, always work hand in hand. Sometimes dramatic aspects of the dialogues kind of affirm or even contradict what is argued for in the dialogues. In the Phaedo, for instance, the figure of Socrates functions as evidence that despite the distrust of his partners in the arguments for the immortality of the soul, the result of these arguments – the immortality of the soul – should be accepted as true. For all participants of the conversation agree that Socrates seems to be a happy person. They also agree that the reason for this is Socrates’ confidence that after death his soul will still exist. By behaving as he does, Socrates persuades his partners that his thesis of the immortality of the soul must be right. That is: Socrates’ performance is meant to persuade where the arguments fail. In my paper I shall argue that this kind of relation between argument and literary form also might be of interest and of help for a better understanding of the closures of some of the dialogues where the result of the argument is disappointing. I shall argue that here, as so often, Plato, the author, kind of comments on the arguments Plato, or rather the protagonists in the dialogues propose. I mainly deal with dialogues like the Euthyphro and the Protagoras, but also will suggest a comparison with the first part of the Parmenides and the Phaedo.
Stephen Halliwell, University of St Andrews
“Where are you going and where have you come from?” Philosophy and discursive form in Plato’s dialogues
This lecture will offer some critical observations on the openings and endings of Platonic dialogues as markers of the complex relationship between discursive form and the activity of philosophy. Openings/endings invite heightened awareness of the narrative and dramatic shapes of the dialogues, marking important but also problematic features of how philosophy is imagined as impinging on the lives of individuals. Comparisons with both literary genres and ‘speech genres’ (in Bakhtin’s sense) can help us to appreciate the richness and intricacy of Plato’s handling of the boundaries of discursive form. Although no single template will account for this aspect of the dialogues, I shall argue that Platonic openings (with their typical indications of philosophy’s perpetual need to make a fresh start) and endings (with their frequent signals of deferral or unfinished business) mediate between the contingency of life and philosophy’s quest for unity of meaning in ways which are resistant to ‘closed’ form. In particular, an Aristotelian model of ‘beginning, middle, end’ cannot cope with the distinctive character of the dialogues. Nor should we take the Phaedrus (to which I will devote some special attention) as legitimising anything like a model of closed form for Plato’s own work: the Phaedrus contains highly significant discussion of discursive form but its famous references to ‘organic form’ do not carry any simple message about how to read Platonic dialogues themselves. By highlighting the junctures between philosophical logos inside and outside the mimetic world of the text, Plato’s openings/endings ultimately require readers to confront their own relationship to philosophy.
Jörg Hardy, Free University of Berlin
The importance of what we care about': Considerations about the prologue of the Laches
When it comes to the topic of the framing of Plato’ s dialogues, the Laches is unique in the corpus Platonicum. The prologue of the Laches, that is, the conversation that preceds the examination of Laches’ and Nicias’ definitions of courage, covers the first half of the entire dialogue and is devoted to central issues of Plato’s Socratic dialogues: caring for the soul and acquiring knowledge about human well-being. In my paper I aim to unfold the philosophical content of the introduction of the Laches, which shows—above all—the meaning of epistemic autonomy and sincerity for any philosophical discussion about virtue and the good life.
George Karamanolis. University of Vienna
The Literary Form of Plato’s Timaeus
The Timaeus starts with a myth and continues until its end with the speech of Timaeus concerning the nature of the universe. The aim of my paper is to examine the nature of the Timaeus’ speech and its relation to the myth that precedes it. I will argue that Plato in the Timaeus sets out to present what we today call a scientific picture of the world by opting for a literary form which challenges that of the scientific writings of his times, such as those of the Presocratics, the Hippocratic writers and the sophists. Plato’s choice of speech underlines the subjective character of the outlined scientific theory, which suggests to the reader that the theory is open to doubt, challenge, criticism but also further elaboration. In this sense the literary form of speech corroborates the dialectical message of eikôs mythos. But Timaeus’ speech is set in a framework by the preceding myth, which critics, ancient and modern, find difficult to square with the following monologue. I will argue that the myth contextualizes the speech by strongly reminding the reader of the discussions and the mythic element in the Republic. The literary form of the Timaeus is crucial then, I will argue, for the correct appreciation of the presented scientific theory about the universe insofar it contextualizes that theory and underscores its open-ended character.
Kathryn Morgan, UCLA
Erotic openings in the Platonic dialogues
Several Platonic dialogues open with a play on erotic themes, featuring Socrates either as lover (Protagoras, Charmides, Theaetetus, Phaedrus), object of love (Phaedrus again), or wry commentator on erotic relationships (Lysis, Charmides, Euthydemus). My talk will explore intellectual flirting and its implications for how eros for wisdom weaves in and out of these openings.
Maria Pavlou, University of Cyprus
Leisure, Teaching, and Philosophy in the Protagoras
The Protagoras subscribes to the category of Platonic dialogues which are embraced with a framing narrative that is extraneous to the main philosophical discussion in terms of time and place, and occasionally of interlocutors and narrative technique. In this paper I focus attention on the framing elements of the dialogue with a view to scrutinising some of the ways in which they intermingle with the main philosophical discussion. To be sure, both the outer and the inner frame of the Protagoras have been the subject of extensive study and much has been written on their intricate relationship to the dialogue’s epistemological part. My intention is not to provide an exhaustive discussion of all possible associations, but rather to examine in more depth one aspect that, to my knowledge, has not until now received adequate attention: the notion of leisure (σχολή) and its role in teaching and philosophy.
Elizabeth Pender, University of Leeds
Socrates Framed
Plato’s story of Socrates’ trial and death is told through four dialogues, Euthyphro, Apology, Crito and Phaedo. This set of dialogues will be treated as a four-part serial drama, with each dialogue a single episode, organised on the basis of separate scenes. Plato’s decision to compose this drama across a number of dialogues rather than in a single work has important consequences. Four independent but sequential narratives are created, with dramatic continuity maintained by the chronological development of the single plot – the unfolding of the final days of Socrates’ human life.
The openings and closings of these inter-related texts are worthy of close attention. As with other dialogues, the openings convey important information on the philosophical conversation to come, while the endings conclude the text in ways appropriate to the particular discussion just witnessed. But since the plot spans different works, the various openings and closings have further work to do. First, the opening of Euthyphro not only sets up the single episode but also the whole four-part series, ending with the concluding scene of Phaedo. Second, the openings and closings of Apology and Crito also necessarily relate to their wider frame, as they carry the continuity of the story: Socrates’ final words in Euthyphro are juxtaposed with his opening statement in Apology; the court-scene of Apology is succeeded by the private confines of the prison-cell in Crito. The format of an extended drama thus offers Plato greater scope for creative experimentation within his chosen literary genre.
The primary aim of this paper is to demonstrate the effects of Plato’s literary techniques of visualization and shifting narrative frames, as used in the story of Socrates. But an analysis of the openings and closings of these selected episodes will also shed light on the art of Platonic composition, showing how particular dramatizations contribute to their respective philosophical projects.
Zacharoula Petraki, University of Crete/ Open University of Cyprus
“In touch with Socrates’: the dramatic frame of the Phaedo”
A number of scholars have drawn attention to the comparisons that can be drawn between the Platonic Socrates and Sophocles’ mythic figure of Oedipus (White 2000; Nagy 2015). These parallels are most prominent in Plato’s portrayal of Socrates in the Apology as the man who devoted his life to test Apollo’s pronouncement that ‘there is no one wiser than Socrates’. Thus Socrates resembles Oedipus in basing his arduous intellectual struggle to achieve a true understanding of himself on the correct interpretation of Apollo’s divination at Delphi; and, in a similar manner, he too pays most dearly his painstaking examination of the divine pronouncement.
In this paper I pursue further the parallels that can be drawn between Socrates and Oedipus by focusing on their idiosyncratic passages to death described in the Phaedo and in the Oedipus at Colonus. I then link Socrates’ attainment of heroic status in the Phaedo, his commemoration and celebration by his circle of students, with Plato’s choice to present Socrates’ final day in the prison and the central philosophic discourse narratologically refracted through the lens of a complex dramatic frame. From this point of view, Plato’s presentation of Socrates in the Phaedo calls also for a comparison with his portrayal in the Symposium, the dialogue which presents him alive and vigorous and which has the most complex dramatic frame in the corpus. I argue that Plato’s imaginative treatment of the body of Socrates in both dialogues directs the readers’ prescribed relationship with the Socratic philosophic logos and highlights the fundamentals of the Socratic legacy: namely the importance of doing philosophy. From that point of view, the complex structure that Plato devises for the relationship between the reader and the conversations of Socrates, rather than creating a distant and indirect connection, demonstrates how Socrates can remain philosophically alive if the philosophic logos is alive.
Spyridon Rangos, University of Patras
“On the proems and closures of Plato’s dialogues in the third Thrasyllian tetralogy”
The unity of the third Thrasyllian tetralogy is not obvious. Neither thematically nor dramatically are the four dialogues contained therein continuous or homogeneous. The Symposium is, to be sure, thematically related to the Phaedrus, since they both deal with erotic love, but how these two dialogues are connected with the preceding Parmenides and Philebus is not clear. The four dialogues differ not only thematically and dramatically but also from a literary point of view. The Parmenides is a narrated dialogue, the Philebus and the Phaedrus straightforwardly dramatic, and the Symposium a mixed kind with a frame dramatic conversation and a subsequent flashback narration. Their closures also differ substantially. The two erotic dialogues are rounded off in the sense that their endings indicate the completion of the event which triggered the previous discussion, and of the discussion itself as a result. But the Philebus is intentionally open-ended; and the Parmenides leaves the reader with a profound sense of puzzlement since the recapitulation of the entire dialectical exercise of the second part of the dialogue is replete with glaring contradictions but crowned with an emphatic “very true” (ἀληθέστατα). The paper will address the question of the unity of the tetralogy by paying due attention to the opening scenes and closures of the dialogues and by trying to understand their relation to the philosophical views contained in the main parts.
Pauliina Remes, Uppsala University
“The prooemium and the skopos: Proclus' Commentary on the First Alcibiades”
The Neoplatonists formulated explicit ideas about how to intepret and understand the the beginnings and endings of Plato's dialogues. The paper will present Proclus' main statements about the hermeneutic he follows. His interpretative line seems to be a moderate one: not every word in the prooemium is pregnant with meaning, but neither are these passages there merely to entertain. This raises the challenge of determining which part of the beginnings should be taken as philosophically more important than others.
Often, as in Proclus, the understanding of a prooemium was tied to the interpretation of the overall theme or goal of the dialogue, its skopos. It is natural that in the beginning of the dialogue, its central theme is already introduced or indicated in some manner. As a methodological concept, skopos is tighter and more specific than a merely lose 'theme'. Skopoi were understood by the neoplatonists to follow certain rules. Among other things, it was believed that each dialogue is governed by one single skopos instead of many. They were seen, further, to govern the whole dialogue, not merely any one part of it. This would already seem to rule out a view that a prooemium could overlook the skopos of a dialogue.
After general remarks about the prooemium and its relationship to skopos, the paper will proceed to analyze the way that the hermenetical principles seem to be used in the interpretation of the prooemium of First Alcibiades by Proclus. This dialogue may have a shorter or less emphatic prooemium than some other dialogues, but this does not prevent Proclus from analyzing it in some detail. The dialogue is further interesting already because of its centrality in the Neoplatonic philosophical curriculum. Its skopos is seem as foundational for the whole philosophical way of life.
The opening of the Charmides : self-restraint in question.
The Charmides opens with the following scene. Socrates has returned the previous evening, so that we are in the winter of 429. Socrates, who is about forty years old, goes to the gymnasium of Taureas. There he meets Charmides, who is slightly older than twenty. Charmides' beauty makes Socrates weak at the knees. To seduce the beautiful young man, who had complained of headaches that very morning to Critias, Socrates declares that he knows a way to cure him: by means of a plant-based remedy and an incantation. By mastering his emotions, Socrates displays that moderation whose definition is being sought in the dialogue, and which must reign in the soul to which the incantation is addressed. The opening of the Charmides, which has great literary beauty, announces the themes that will be developed in the dialogue.
Jenny Bryan, UCL
On the openings of Plato's Parmenides and Timaeus
Scholars have long debated the implications of the apparently inconsistent metaphysical positions of Plato’s Parmenides and his Timaeus and disagreed as to their relative dating and relation to Plato’s own thought. Despite these provocative differences and disagreements, we can identify one intriguing point of similarity between the two: both begin with clear (albeit very distinct) allusions to the Republic.
This paper examines the significance of this shared opening allusion for our understanding of each dialogue, both in terms of their relation to the Republic and to one another and in terms of how the opening of each dialogue relates to what comes after. It will consider the differences in the ways that each dialogue sets up the connection with the Republic. Why does the Parmenides employ a reference to Adeimantus and Glaucon whilst the Timaeus relies on Socrates own retelling of his conversation? What should we make of the fact that the Parmenides offers an allusion that, according to the dramatic order of the dialogues, must be to a discourse which happened long before Antiphon's retelling but also due to occur some time after the conversation related between Parmenides and Socrates? How does this compare with Socrates’ reference in the Timaeus to a conversation from ‘yesterday’? Why is the reference in the Parmenides built into the framing and potentially distancing device of the retelling by Antiphon whilst it is Socrates himself who recalls the conversation in the Timaeus? The paper will also reflect on the question to what degree the opening passages of each dialogue provide a key to understanding the possible coherence of what follows and the relation between the metaphysics of the Parmenides, Timaeus and Republic. It will consider the possibility that the greater immediacy of the Timaeus’ allusion to the Republic indicates its relative superiority (in some sense) to the Parmenides.
Andrea Capra, University of Milan
Poetic beginnings and silenic closures in Plato's erotic dialogues
This paper argues that the beginnings of Plato’s Lysis, Phaedrus and Symposium, are self-consciously poetic, whereas their closures conjure up the world of satyrs. I conclude by pondering the rationale of this surprising pattern.
The Lysis opens with a poetic exchange between Hippothales and Socrates, who utter, respectively, an iambic trimeter and a funny quasi-hexameter. This curious feature has escaped the attention of modern scholars, but, arguably, it was fully grasped by Plato's contemporaries: a remarkable echo can be heard in the extant trimeters of Alexis' Phaedrus. The Symposium, in turn, displays a famously complex narrative frame, which is demonstrably modelled on the magnetic chain of poetry described in the Ion: thus, the very structure of the dialogue turns out to be poetic in essence. As for the Phaedrus, I draw attention on an early reference to the palinode motif that informs the first part of the dialogue: while walking towards the plane-tree, Phaedrus and Socrates question the myth of Oreithyia: ‘is this story true’? This foreshadows the palinode motif, as Socrates addresses Helen’s similar myth and ends up quoting Stesichorus: ‘this story isn’t true’.
The closure of the Lysis features the only violent scene in the Platonic corpus, as the drunken pedagogues break into the gymnasium. Their irruption calls to mind satyr plays as well as comedies, but contextual elements suggest that the former are a more important model. The closures of both Symposium and Phaedrus emphasize the mixture between the higher and the lower, the serious and the comic. In both cases, such a mixture, while pointing back to crucial moments of the dialogue, seems to imply a connection with Socrates’ silenic persona and with the mixed nature of Sokratikoi logoi as a genre.
Three markedly ‘poetic’ beginnings are followed by three equally ‘satyric’ closures. I conclude my paper with the suggestion that this remarkable pattern is integral to the shared subject of love: Platonic eros is ‘poetic’ as it prompts the production of logoi and is ‘satyric’ in that it combines the high and the low.
Carlotta Capuccino, University of Bologna
Paradoxical Proems: The relationship between diégesis and mímesis in Plato' s dialogues.
In their lively and complex architectures that make them unique and irreducible to one another, the proems of Plato’s dialogues are not only “paths of flowers” traced to accompany the reader to “the thorns and thistles” of metaphysical arguments, as Hegel called them. These introductory scenes are not just a literary ornament of Plato’s philosophy, but contain a clever allusion to the meaning of his dialectical writing and his authorial anonymity. Plato chose to write anonymous philosophical dialogues, so we do not ever hear his voice expressing itself on the important issues discussed by Socrates and the other characters. The thesis I would argue for is that the proems are the place where Plato has instead decided to make listen, in an allusive way, his voice not about the individual contents of his doctrine, but on the meaning and form of his written philosophy. By reinterpreting the traditional role of exordia, the Platonic proems perform the indispensable philosophical function of preserving the sense of Plato’s philosophy for the reader akin to it.
The Platonic dialogues have two different writing styles: some, like Euthyphro or Phaedrus, adopt a dramatic style, i.e. the direct exchange of words between the characters; others, such as the Republic, the narrative or indirect style, where the exchange of words is introduced by the voice of a narrator, which alternates with that of the characters. But there is a particular group of six dialogues, the so-called “mixed dialogues” (Protagoras, Euthydemus, Phaedo, Symposium, Parmenides and Theaetetus), in which the two styles alternate giving rise to a structural anomaly: the dialogue, usually tripartite in a proem, a middle part and an epilogue, appears two-headed, that is equipped with a double proem. The proem “internal” to the dialogical scene is in fact preceded by an “external” proem which sounds paradoxical because set in a place and at a time other than the place and time of the dialogue, and often between different interlocutors. They are especially these paradoxical proems, with their skilful narrative plays, which contain allusions to Plato’s thesis on what ultimately is the preferable style, between mímesis and diégesis, for a good philosophical writing.
Pierre Destrée, University of Louvain
Sex, Laughter and Philosophy in the Symposium
In this paper, I offer a new understanding of the famous, yet rather mysterious, last words of Socrates as reported by Aristodemus: “The key point was that Socrates was pressing them to agree that the same man should be capable of writing both tragedy and comedy” (223d). It is no wonder that Socrates addresses these words to Agathon and Aristophanes, but their relevance is both more specific and much broader than usually thought. Specifically, Plato wants to describe how one should read Diotima’s (tragic) speech together with Alcibiades’ (comic) speech ; and, more broadly, Plato wants to underline what he has been doing all through this dialogue – from the very first pun on Apollodorus’ demotic (172a) and the wool thread joke (175d) up to the highly funny last speech – that is using laughter as a tool to convince the symposiasts, and his readers, of one of his central, serious, philosophical points: that education in virtue is not to be conceived of as paiderastia, or more generally, as transmission of knowledge.
Michael Erler, Wuerzburg University
Argumentative aporia and dramatic euporia. The closures of and in the Protagoras and the Euthyphro
Argument and literary form, and how both relate to each other and the interrelations between both, are important aspects for any interpreter for any interpretation of the Platonic dialogues, because Plato, the author, and Plato, the philosopher, always work hand in hand. Sometimes dramatic aspects of the dialogues kind of affirm or even contradict what is argued for in the dialogues. In the Phaedo, for instance, the figure of Socrates functions as evidence that despite the distrust of his partners in the arguments for the immortality of the soul, the result of these arguments – the immortality of the soul – should be accepted as true. For all participants of the conversation agree that Socrates seems to be a happy person. They also agree that the reason for this is Socrates’ confidence that after death his soul will still exist. By behaving as he does, Socrates persuades his partners that his thesis of the immortality of the soul must be right. That is: Socrates’ performance is meant to persuade where the arguments fail. In my paper I shall argue that this kind of relation between argument and literary form also might be of interest and of help for a better understanding of the closures of some of the dialogues where the result of the argument is disappointing. I shall argue that here, as so often, Plato, the author, kind of comments on the arguments Plato, or rather the protagonists in the dialogues propose. I mainly deal with dialogues like the Euthyphro and the Protagoras, but also will suggest a comparison with the first part of the Parmenides and the Phaedo.
Stephen Halliwell, University of St Andrews
“Where are you going and where have you come from?” Philosophy and discursive form in Plato’s dialogues
This lecture will offer some critical observations on the openings and endings of Platonic dialogues as markers of the complex relationship between discursive form and the activity of philosophy. Openings/endings invite heightened awareness of the narrative and dramatic shapes of the dialogues, marking important but also problematic features of how philosophy is imagined as impinging on the lives of individuals. Comparisons with both literary genres and ‘speech genres’ (in Bakhtin’s sense) can help us to appreciate the richness and intricacy of Plato’s handling of the boundaries of discursive form. Although no single template will account for this aspect of the dialogues, I shall argue that Platonic openings (with their typical indications of philosophy’s perpetual need to make a fresh start) and endings (with their frequent signals of deferral or unfinished business) mediate between the contingency of life and philosophy’s quest for unity of meaning in ways which are resistant to ‘closed’ form. In particular, an Aristotelian model of ‘beginning, middle, end’ cannot cope with the distinctive character of the dialogues. Nor should we take the Phaedrus (to which I will devote some special attention) as legitimising anything like a model of closed form for Plato’s own work: the Phaedrus contains highly significant discussion of discursive form but its famous references to ‘organic form’ do not carry any simple message about how to read Platonic dialogues themselves. By highlighting the junctures between philosophical logos inside and outside the mimetic world of the text, Plato’s openings/endings ultimately require readers to confront their own relationship to philosophy.
Jörg Hardy, Free University of Berlin
The importance of what we care about': Considerations about the prologue of the Laches
When it comes to the topic of the framing of Plato’ s dialogues, the Laches is unique in the corpus Platonicum. The prologue of the Laches, that is, the conversation that preceds the examination of Laches’ and Nicias’ definitions of courage, covers the first half of the entire dialogue and is devoted to central issues of Plato’s Socratic dialogues: caring for the soul and acquiring knowledge about human well-being. In my paper I aim to unfold the philosophical content of the introduction of the Laches, which shows—above all—the meaning of epistemic autonomy and sincerity for any philosophical discussion about virtue and the good life.
George Karamanolis. University of Vienna
The Literary Form of Plato’s Timaeus
The Timaeus starts with a myth and continues until its end with the speech of Timaeus concerning the nature of the universe. The aim of my paper is to examine the nature of the Timaeus’ speech and its relation to the myth that precedes it. I will argue that Plato in the Timaeus sets out to present what we today call a scientific picture of the world by opting for a literary form which challenges that of the scientific writings of his times, such as those of the Presocratics, the Hippocratic writers and the sophists. Plato’s choice of speech underlines the subjective character of the outlined scientific theory, which suggests to the reader that the theory is open to doubt, challenge, criticism but also further elaboration. In this sense the literary form of speech corroborates the dialectical message of eikôs mythos. But Timaeus’ speech is set in a framework by the preceding myth, which critics, ancient and modern, find difficult to square with the following monologue. I will argue that the myth contextualizes the speech by strongly reminding the reader of the discussions and the mythic element in the Republic. The literary form of the Timaeus is crucial then, I will argue, for the correct appreciation of the presented scientific theory about the universe insofar it contextualizes that theory and underscores its open-ended character.
Kathryn Morgan, UCLA
Erotic openings in the Platonic dialogues
Several Platonic dialogues open with a play on erotic themes, featuring Socrates either as lover (Protagoras, Charmides, Theaetetus, Phaedrus), object of love (Phaedrus again), or wry commentator on erotic relationships (Lysis, Charmides, Euthydemus). My talk will explore intellectual flirting and its implications for how eros for wisdom weaves in and out of these openings.
Maria Pavlou, University of Cyprus
Leisure, Teaching, and Philosophy in the Protagoras
The Protagoras subscribes to the category of Platonic dialogues which are embraced with a framing narrative that is extraneous to the main philosophical discussion in terms of time and place, and occasionally of interlocutors and narrative technique. In this paper I focus attention on the framing elements of the dialogue with a view to scrutinising some of the ways in which they intermingle with the main philosophical discussion. To be sure, both the outer and the inner frame of the Protagoras have been the subject of extensive study and much has been written on their intricate relationship to the dialogue’s epistemological part. My intention is not to provide an exhaustive discussion of all possible associations, but rather to examine in more depth one aspect that, to my knowledge, has not until now received adequate attention: the notion of leisure (σχολή) and its role in teaching and philosophy.
Elizabeth Pender, University of Leeds
Socrates Framed
Plato’s story of Socrates’ trial and death is told through four dialogues, Euthyphro, Apology, Crito and Phaedo. This set of dialogues will be treated as a four-part serial drama, with each dialogue a single episode, organised on the basis of separate scenes. Plato’s decision to compose this drama across a number of dialogues rather than in a single work has important consequences. Four independent but sequential narratives are created, with dramatic continuity maintained by the chronological development of the single plot – the unfolding of the final days of Socrates’ human life.
The openings and closings of these inter-related texts are worthy of close attention. As with other dialogues, the openings convey important information on the philosophical conversation to come, while the endings conclude the text in ways appropriate to the particular discussion just witnessed. But since the plot spans different works, the various openings and closings have further work to do. First, the opening of Euthyphro not only sets up the single episode but also the whole four-part series, ending with the concluding scene of Phaedo. Second, the openings and closings of Apology and Crito also necessarily relate to their wider frame, as they carry the continuity of the story: Socrates’ final words in Euthyphro are juxtaposed with his opening statement in Apology; the court-scene of Apology is succeeded by the private confines of the prison-cell in Crito. The format of an extended drama thus offers Plato greater scope for creative experimentation within his chosen literary genre.
The primary aim of this paper is to demonstrate the effects of Plato’s literary techniques of visualization and shifting narrative frames, as used in the story of Socrates. But an analysis of the openings and closings of these selected episodes will also shed light on the art of Platonic composition, showing how particular dramatizations contribute to their respective philosophical projects.
Zacharoula Petraki, University of Crete/ Open University of Cyprus
“In touch with Socrates’: the dramatic frame of the Phaedo”
A number of scholars have drawn attention to the comparisons that can be drawn between the Platonic Socrates and Sophocles’ mythic figure of Oedipus (White 2000; Nagy 2015). These parallels are most prominent in Plato’s portrayal of Socrates in the Apology as the man who devoted his life to test Apollo’s pronouncement that ‘there is no one wiser than Socrates’. Thus Socrates resembles Oedipus in basing his arduous intellectual struggle to achieve a true understanding of himself on the correct interpretation of Apollo’s divination at Delphi; and, in a similar manner, he too pays most dearly his painstaking examination of the divine pronouncement.
In this paper I pursue further the parallels that can be drawn between Socrates and Oedipus by focusing on their idiosyncratic passages to death described in the Phaedo and in the Oedipus at Colonus. I then link Socrates’ attainment of heroic status in the Phaedo, his commemoration and celebration by his circle of students, with Plato’s choice to present Socrates’ final day in the prison and the central philosophic discourse narratologically refracted through the lens of a complex dramatic frame. From this point of view, Plato’s presentation of Socrates in the Phaedo calls also for a comparison with his portrayal in the Symposium, the dialogue which presents him alive and vigorous and which has the most complex dramatic frame in the corpus. I argue that Plato’s imaginative treatment of the body of Socrates in both dialogues directs the readers’ prescribed relationship with the Socratic philosophic logos and highlights the fundamentals of the Socratic legacy: namely the importance of doing philosophy. From that point of view, the complex structure that Plato devises for the relationship between the reader and the conversations of Socrates, rather than creating a distant and indirect connection, demonstrates how Socrates can remain philosophically alive if the philosophic logos is alive.
Spyridon Rangos, University of Patras
“On the proems and closures of Plato’s dialogues in the third Thrasyllian tetralogy”
The unity of the third Thrasyllian tetralogy is not obvious. Neither thematically nor dramatically are the four dialogues contained therein continuous or homogeneous. The Symposium is, to be sure, thematically related to the Phaedrus, since they both deal with erotic love, but how these two dialogues are connected with the preceding Parmenides and Philebus is not clear. The four dialogues differ not only thematically and dramatically but also from a literary point of view. The Parmenides is a narrated dialogue, the Philebus and the Phaedrus straightforwardly dramatic, and the Symposium a mixed kind with a frame dramatic conversation and a subsequent flashback narration. Their closures also differ substantially. The two erotic dialogues are rounded off in the sense that their endings indicate the completion of the event which triggered the previous discussion, and of the discussion itself as a result. But the Philebus is intentionally open-ended; and the Parmenides leaves the reader with a profound sense of puzzlement since the recapitulation of the entire dialectical exercise of the second part of the dialogue is replete with glaring contradictions but crowned with an emphatic “very true” (ἀληθέστατα). The paper will address the question of the unity of the tetralogy by paying due attention to the opening scenes and closures of the dialogues and by trying to understand their relation to the philosophical views contained in the main parts.
Pauliina Remes, Uppsala University
“The prooemium and the skopos: Proclus' Commentary on the First Alcibiades”
The Neoplatonists formulated explicit ideas about how to intepret and understand the the beginnings and endings of Plato's dialogues. The paper will present Proclus' main statements about the hermeneutic he follows. His interpretative line seems to be a moderate one: not every word in the prooemium is pregnant with meaning, but neither are these passages there merely to entertain. This raises the challenge of determining which part of the beginnings should be taken as philosophically more important than others.
Often, as in Proclus, the understanding of a prooemium was tied to the interpretation of the overall theme or goal of the dialogue, its skopos. It is natural that in the beginning of the dialogue, its central theme is already introduced or indicated in some manner. As a methodological concept, skopos is tighter and more specific than a merely lose 'theme'. Skopoi were understood by the neoplatonists to follow certain rules. Among other things, it was believed that each dialogue is governed by one single skopos instead of many. They were seen, further, to govern the whole dialogue, not merely any one part of it. This would already seem to rule out a view that a prooemium could overlook the skopos of a dialogue.
After general remarks about the prooemium and its relationship to skopos, the paper will proceed to analyze the way that the hermenetical principles seem to be used in the interpretation of the prooemium of First Alcibiades by Proclus. This dialogue may have a shorter or less emphatic prooemium than some other dialogues, but this does not prevent Proclus from analyzing it in some detail. The dialogue is further interesting already because of its centrality in the Neoplatonic philosophical curriculum. Its skopos is seem as foundational for the whole philosophical way of life.