Anyone who read and enjoyed Allan Bloom's famous translation of the Republic will also enjoy these -- they are written in the same spirit. Don't waste your money on any other translation of these dialogues.
Oh, and I might add, the dialogues themselves are masterpieces of philosophy, and of Western literature. The Gorgias may well be, after the Republic and the Laws, Plato's thrid most important work. Must reading for anyone concerned about the fate of justice and morality in these troubled times.
When we assume that the Phaedrus is well written and the author is cogent, then we get commentaries on it like this one that takes the imagery, myth and eroticism of the Phaedrus seriously and explicate it brilliantly. Ferrari covers all the various aspects of the Phaedrus, showing that the parts do make a consistent whole, even a beautiful and profound one. Plato's aim is to show how rhetoric and philosophy differ from each other, as do their practitioners. This he does by having the two interlocutors present three speeches and then speak about the speeches. The speeches are about love, authentic and inauthentic.
What Plato does in Phaedrus cannot be called psychology, it must be called psychomythology. The problem is to comment without demythologizing (Socrates denounces demythologizing as activity for the wise man with nothing better to do). Rather, Ferrari respectfully explicates the myth as myth (unlike Pirsig in Zen and Motorcycle Maintenance), achieving a clarity and fertility of interpretation that is very persuasive. It has to be persuasive because in the end he takes on Jacques Derrida and his famous interpretation of Phaedrus "Plato's Pharmacy" (In his book "Dissemination").
Because of the profoundity of its subject matter, this book is no easy read. But Ferrari helps us out by avoiding academese and writing in a clear, even elegant style. One seldom reads a book so completely satisfying as this one
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Letter," purportedly ascribed to Plato, in this edition of
the *Phaedrus* deserves a comment or two. The translation
and Introductions in this edition by Penguin Classics are
by Walter Hamilton. The edition is copyrighted 1973, but
the copy I have has a last reprinting date of 1988.
The "Introduction" to the Letters states: "Plato's written
works include, in addition to the dialogues, a collection
of thirteen letters. They have formed part of the Platonic
canon since the 1st century A.D. and possibly since the
3rd century B.C., and one in particular, the Seventh,
which is as long as all the rest together, is a document
of crucial importance for our knowledge of Plato's life.
It opens with an account of his early development and of
his reasons for abstaining from public affairs, and it
records in detail the motives which led -- in later life --
to his famous and unsuccessful excursion into the practical
politics of Sicily and his relations with Dionysius II of
Syracuse. It may almost be said that without the Seventh
Letter, Plato's personal history would be unknown."
Plato's relation in the 7th Letter is: "When I was a
young man I expected, like many others to embark, as
soon as I was my own master, on a political career."
[But a revolution occurs in Athens...and the rule of
the 30 is established.] "Naturally enough, in view of
my youth,I expected that this government would bring
about a change from corrupt to upright administration,
and I watched with the keenest interest to see what
they would do. I found that it had taken these men
no time at all to make the previous government look like
an age of gold... So when I saw this and the kind
of men who were active in politics and the principles
on which things were managed, I concluded that it was
difficult to take part in public life and retain one's
integrity, and this feeling became stronger the more I
observed and the older I became."
The *Phaedrus,* on the other hand,
deals with the nature of Love...and the Soul...and
the Realm of Reality and Truth beyond this world
of the senses and shadows... illusions...the Love
spoken of is spoken of in context with the Athenian
mores of the time...it is the Love between two males...
Hamilton's edition is excellent in many ways...he
divides the text at important places and inserts titles
and analyses which alert the reader to the topics which
are going to be discussed in the next section--and
his footnotes are excellent and enlightening as well.
Here are examples of two of his title inserts at most
important places in the dialogue: The Myth./The Allegory
of the Charioteer and His Horses./The Procession of the
Gods and the Vision of Reality./The Fall, Incarnation,
and Liberation of the Soul./The Privilege of the
Philosopher./Recollection as a Means to the Recapture
of Knowledge of the Forms./" ...and... "The Charioteer
Allegory Resumed./The Subjugation of Appetite, typified
by the Bad Horse, and The Awakening of Love for the
Lover in the Beloved./A Concluding Prayer to the God
for Lysias and Phaedrus./"
Hamilton's translation of the dialogue is good, though
there are places that don't please me personally, such
as this: "You are a dear fellow, Phaedrus, genuine gold
all through, if you suppose me to mean that Lysias has
completely missed the mark, and that it is possible to
compose a second entirely different speech." Benjamin
Jowett, in the Dover edition containing both *Symposium*
and *Phaedrus,* translates this as: "You are a dear golden
simpleton if you suppose me to mean that Lysias has
altogether missed the mark, and that I can make a speech
from which all his arguments are to be excluded." And
R. Hackforth, in the Collected Dialogues and Letters
edited by Edith Hamilton and Huntington Cairns, translates
it as: "How kind you are, Phaedrus, and what a pattern
of golden-age simplicity, in supposing me to mean that
Lysias has wholly missed the mark and that another speech
could avoid all his points! Surely that couldn't be so
even with the most worthless of writers."
I much prefer the R. Hackforth translation...it seems
to me to be TRUER to the Spirit and the Subject of the
dialogue...he doesn't flinch...and his prose is clear
and lucid...and meaningful...
But this Hamilton edition is less expensive...as is
the Dover Jowett...and this Hamilton edition has the
excellent inserts in the text which explain what is
being discussed and the flow and pattern
of the argument:
"The argument for the immortality of soul is, like
the final argument of the *Phaedo,* a dialectical
argument; Plato believes that this is something
which can rightly be demonstrated. What soul is
like, however, and the nature of its existence
can be described only in symbols, or what Plato
terms a 'myth.'"
Here is Hamilton at his best: "...and when he
catches sight of the loved one [he] is ready to die
of fear. So at last it comes about that the soul of
the lover waits upon his beloved in reverence and awe.
Thus the beloved finds himself being treated like a god
and receiving all manner of service from a lover whose
love is true love and no pretence, and his own
nature disposes him to feel kindly towards his
admirer."
...it appears the dialogue, here, also resorts
to myth...
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I find it interesting that although many things have changed over the centuries, many things also have remained the same. Mankind is still struggling to answer questions regarding immortality and sexuality. While we may have better scientific answers to many things in mordern society, we have't progressed very far in the psychological aspect of things.
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Death is the ultimate bummer in the ancient Greek worldview. It is not a pretty picture. As seen in the Odyssey, death can be a very nasty place. Even for the best---heroes like Achilles, death is like an eternal waiting room with no eventual appointment. How unsurprising then, that Socrates, who loved to turn Greek convention on its ear, would envision death as the ultimate journey, the ultimate freedom.
Socrates sees the chief value of death as the soul's final separation from the horrid constraints of the body. According to him, the body holds back the soul. With it, man can never encounter the ultimate justice, beauty and truth. Without the body, all things seem possible to Socrates. As far as this line of thinking goes, I find Socrates' thought to be very similar to some forms of Buddhism and the more extreme kinds of Christian asceticism (largely influenced by Plato's Socrates).
However, Socrates goes beyond this. He claims that there is some kind of reward that awaits those who willingly come to death. A seat among the gods he calls it...
How ironic then that Socrates dies amidst the worldly concern of a debt that he owes.
How does that old line go? Something about folks trying to save their own life losing it?
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Graeme Nicholson is a professor of philosophy at the University of Toronto and a fellow of Trinity College. His book is a study of the Phaedrus prepared as part of a series of Purdue University Press' History of Philosophy Series, each volume of which is devoted to a detailed consideration of a specific philosophical text. The Phaedrus has received such consideration in other studies (by Charles Griswold, Luc Brisson, Seth Bernadette, among other scholars), but the work is inexhaustible and well deserves the extended treatment it receives here. Nicholson, properly and commendably, philosophizes with Plato. He sees the ancient character of the texts but does not stop there. He tries to show how the Phaedrus, with all its antiquity, addresses problems of modern readers in an important an elucidating way.
Nicholson's focus is on the nature of love. Many readers understand Plato to argue that eros is a step on the way to a broader, rationalistic understanding of the ideas. But Nicholson argues well that the Phaedrus reverses this pattern. Plato here sees eros and passion - a commitment to study and to understanding and a fire within one -- as a precondition to any serious endeavor, philosophical or otherwise. Nicholson proceeds to show how this understanding of eros allows Plato in the Phaedrus to take a broader view of the nature of myth, poetry, rhetoric, and music as themselves contributing to and enabling the process of philosophical understanding. I find this a valuable insight into the Phaedrus.
Nicholson also has challenging things to say about Plato's concept of being (or of being-beyond-being). He sees this as a spritual and valuable concept, to simplify broadly, and as an important and, with current explanations and explications, viable antidote to much of the scientism and materialism in contemporary thought and in the assumptions of many people. This too is a valuable and thoughtful way of approaching the Phaedrus.
The core of Professor Nicholson's study is Socrates's great speech on love which he presents in Part II of the book in a fresh translation. This translation is followed by a long, careful, exploration in Part III of the various themes of the book. Part I of the book gives backround on Plato and on the Phaedrus's relationship to Plato's body of work. There are introductory chapters on myth, rhetoric, dialectic, and writing. All these themes are important to the Phaedrus and they are developed with good use of authority to other Platonic and Greek texts, and to the work of modern philosophers and scholars.
The book suffers somewhat but ignoring Plato's own order of presentation. There is this a lack of attention to the dramatic development -- to the manner in which Plato tries to show the interrelationship of the themes of the Phaedrus -- how one leads into another. This is no small task. Thus in the early sections of the book, Professor Nicholson discusses themes that Plato reserves for the end of the dialogue -- such as the nature of dialectic and the relative merits of writing and discussion. (The story of the god Theuth and his gift of writing to the King of Egypt is discussed early in Nicholson, for example, but it appears only at the end of the Phaedrus.) The presentation thus misses some of the opportunities to discuss how Plato and the reader should view the development of the themes in the dialogue.
It is good to read the Phaedrus -- or to reread it as the case may be -- in the context of reading and studying this book. I thought the book helped me understand and appreciate the Phaedrus and Plato. This great ancient philsopher has much to teach us.
As I said, it's division and gathering that is evident in all of our arguments. We make our claims based upon the similarities and differences in things, and this is the core of argumentation.
In his dialogue style, Plato talks about many other things, that range from what makes a good writing a good one, to the heritance of knowledge. How should knowledge be attained from others? How should we present our knowledge for new generations to understand us? These are some of the questions that come up in Phaedrus.
Plato, one of the clearest writers in philosophy, wrote yet another beautiful work. I've started reading Plato when I was thirteen, and I really enjoy reading his works, which just flow.
I recommend not only this book, but almost any book of Plato's, for all philosophy lovers out there, and all those that would like to make their first attempt in understanding some philosophical issues, which build the base of our living.