Eros and the Intoxications of Enlightenment: On Plato's Symposium

by Berg, Steven

• ISBN13: 9781438430188
• ISBN10: 1438430183
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2011-01-02
• Publisher: State Univ of New York Pr

Summary

An original analysis of one of Plato's most well-known and pivotal dialogues, this study is based upon the effort to think together the most manifest themes of the Symposium (the nature of eros and the relation between poetry and philosophy) with its less obvious but no less essential themes (the character of the city and the nature and limitations of sophistic enlightenment). Author Steven Berg offers an interpretation of this dialogue wherein all the speakers at the banquet-with the exception of Socrates-not only offer their views on the nature of love, but represent Athens and the Athenian enlightenment. Accordingly, Socrates' speech, taken in relation to the speeches that precede it, is shown to articulate the relation between Socrates and the Athenian enlightenment, to expose the limitations of that enlightenment, and therefore finally to bring to light the irresolvable tension between Socrates and his philosophy and the city of Athens even at her most enlightened. Book jacket.

Author Biography

Steven Berg is Associate Professor of Philosophy at Bellarmine University.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments	p. vii
Introduction	p. ix
Athens and Enlightenment	p. 1
Socrates Made Beautiful	p. 3
Phaedrus: Phaedrus' Best City in Speech	p. 15
Pausanias: Noble Lies and the Fulfillment of Greekness	p. 25
Eryximachus: Sovereign Science and the Sacred Law	p. 37
Athens and the Poets	p. 57
Aristophanes: Eros, Soul, and Law	p. 59
Agathon: Eros, Soul, and Rhetoric	p. 73
Socrates and Athens	p. 93
Socrates: Daimonic Eros	p. 95
Alcibiades: Divine Socrates	p. 131
Conclusion: Socrates and Plato	p. 151
Notes	p. 155
Index	p. 169
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