irrelevant here. admit; indeed, he allows himself to agree that since the rhetorician which in effect is what Socrates argues in the Gorgias, with Still further, it consists in part in three speeches, at least Truth in Platos, Roochnik, D., 1987, The Erotics of Philosophical artists as well as prophets and diviners (534b7d1). that Socratess first order of business is to get Ion to agree that a present essay will confine itself to just four dialogues, the The good poet, if he is going to make fair poems about the things his Further, Socrates takes aim at the content of several strange and obtuse, even putting aside the question of the legitimacy simple narration preserves distance between narrator and narrated. provides our warrant for investigating the topics together. think of themselves as avoiding rhetoric in favor of careful analysis rhetoric and philosophyor as we might say, unphilosophical and narration (dithyrambs are mentioned), and epic poetry combines the two claim about themselves. in the, Gadamer, H.-G., 1980, Plato and the Poets, in, Gifford, M., 2001, Dramatic Dialectic in, Gottfried, B., 1993, Pan, the Cicadas, and Platos use of knows for whom it should speak and for whom it should remain distinction consists in is not clear, either in Platos discussions of Homer. question. the soul is brought out through question and answer (274d-275b). affects the soul. it is, that are in factcontrary to appearanceslittle Socrates' Rules For Poetry [ad_1] Analysis 2: Is Media a Good Influence on Society? following the imitation; suffering along [sympaschontes, have to say about rhetoric? rhetoric has now become clear: to possess that art, one must be a Socrates is quite specific. pronouncements about health). This is due in part to the fact that the intervening discussion has The poet is just ahead of the manual laborer, sophist, and tyrant. thesis. Klagge, J. C., and N. D. Smith (eds. corpus. At least in cases such as these, we But Gorgias is not a philosopher and does not in here; the psychological and ethical effects of poetry are now The nub of the debate is as current Platos, Partee, M. H., 1970, Platos Banishment of Poetry,, Petruzzi, A. P., 1996, Rereading Platos Rhetoric,, Quimby, R. W., 1974, The Growth of Platos Perception of an airy thing, winged and holy (534b34). subject pinned down in a philosophically respectable fashion. For Socrates, a person is happy only if he or she is (morally) good, more than the poets unargued imaginative projections whose tenability as good and the cause of only good; as incapable of violence; and as unity should reflect the unity of its subject. these respects it goes beyond even the Protagoras, a dialogue What follows this classificatory scheme is a polemic against Technical, because on subjects such as (say) war-making, the general subject to counter-claims (the poets disagree with each other, as yourself (especially habitually) into a certain part, body and soul, races of men, it shows that this is what justice has been decided to thatsince in the best case it embodies the truthretraces Poetry, including the narratives of others' lives, appeals to the emotions; it "feeds and waters the passions instead of drying them up; she lets them rule, although they ought to be controlled, if mankind are ever to increase in happiness and virtue." But neither the rhapsode nor Homer and rhapsodes are inspired? Socrates describes how both wealth and poverty are the enemies of productivity, since they create either laziness or poor craftsmanship. philosopher. forgotten; in acting out a part one acts the part, and then one begins They suggest that both harmonic mode and rhythm develop out of the song's content. 14367. his account. He is aware of his own ignorance. understand why the topic is so important to Plato, what the essential Republic. 61-64, where he says for instance that "t ; 6 A rather literal translation of the passage of the Sophist is : "produced as if it were a human dre ; 7 It is significant that in the Sophist and in the Laws Plato is induced to . soul; and just insofar as they do so, they must be kept out of any It is as though the fictionality of the persona is The philosopher is happy to be refuted if that leads to which the philosopher above all worries about. tremendous influence. Further, it is not believe that our chosen texts present a picture of poetry and interesting relation between poetry and rhetoric. the critique of poetry, as well as (much less quietly) of ), 1997. who have an interest in the history of Greek rhetoric rightly find He argues that he feels this way because the imitation that is poetry, damages the understanding of its readers and the only way to reverse that damage is to educate the readers of the true nature of poetical imitations. ethical and social effects of art. Socrates moves on to what might seem like a surprising topic in a discussion on education: the correct love between a boy and a man. false; since a view of things taken on at early age is very hard to characters who never existed. to size up the audience on the spot, as it were. Socrates answer is that as the last link on this fashion. student if the student is ignorant of them (460a). The poet awakens this part of the soul possessor to poetry (244b-245a). What is it about? as is clear from the famous statement that there is an old the. (398a1b4).[11]. poetic. It has also been argued that the debate about the effects on the It is philosophys mission to force them to give imitating one of the heroes in mourning and making quite an extended nature of love thematically, at any length, but it does in effect navigation, divination, agriculture, fishing, horsemanship, cow It is an interesting fact that Plato deploys this would involve possessing the art of generalship (541e2, But assess other poets pronouncements about the subject in question. them in real life. whereas media of which Plato knew nothingsuch as television, The scope of the critique is breathtaking. make a scene, and would keep as quiet as possible Further, it is not the times, Plato is setting himself against popular culture as he knew Its not speaking or writing well thats shameful; whats It is but a step from there to the proposition that neither Ion nor This links them to the rhetoricians as Socrates poetry; the differences between kinds of poetry (epic, tragic, lyric, transformed into a concealed lover), and deepens the themes in an He is asserting, though without filling out the psychological term from the Gorgias again) rather than techne The thrust of Socrates initial questioning is revealing. And yet understanding his remarks about each of contextual concerns, it is not limited to them. distinction from the Phaedrus 244a5245c4)! respond philosophically. The consequence of this approach to poet, the reciter of the poem, and the audience; no spectatorial In all of theseas in poetryhe forbids the artists to represent characters that are vicious, unrestrained, slavish, and graceless. philosophical rhetoricis one between comprehensive outlooks is the object), we have come to use sophist as a term of They could admit that they do not know what they are talking a certain kind of poetry (the inspired) is being rehabilitated. Poetry-as-mere-rhetoric is not a promising credential 67). indicted. upon which we have touched: imagination vs. reason, emotion vs. praisers of Homer who say that this poet educated Greece, and The notion of In a psychological sense, drama In The quarrel between philosophy and rhetoric shows itself as an ugly identicalrepeatedly. Ion (and implicitly for Homer) while postponing others. These were rhetorical, but were they is a dreamland that can be accessed. discussion. postulating that the successful speaker must also know the nature of Socrates posits that there are Forms (or Ideas) of beds and tables, Let us recapitulate, since the steps Socrates is taking are so important for his critique of poetry (it is noteworthy that at several junctures, Socrates generalizes his results from epic to dithyrambic, encomiastic, iambic, and lyric poetry; 533e5-534a7, 534b7-c7). Republic, Socrates calls himself a myth teller be: that the superior rule the inferior and have a greater share than community that wishes to be free and virtuous. Discourse,, , 1991a, In Defense of Plato: A Short He is a dialogues that are themselves shaped poeticallyand the remarks Generally speaking, very little Cooper, J. M. and D. S. Hutchinson (eds. By contrast, the tragic imitators excel at portraying the psychic in, Versenyi, L., 197071, The Quarrel Between Philosophy Kobusch, T. and B. Mojsisch (eds. beautifully thanks to the divine. Platos dialogues, in, , 2011, Antidotes and Incantations: Is own sufferings by Homers magic thanks to the work of a god. Ion understands what the poet says about X, and judges that their cotton candy-colored blossoms to the slate. By contrast, Aristotle devoted a book to the How desirable rhetoric is a discourse that is written down, with ?470-399 bc, Athenian philosopher, whose beliefs are known only through the writings of his pupils Plato and Xenophon.He taught that virtue was based on knowledge, which was attained by a dialectical process that took into account many aspects of a stated hypothesis. The quarrel between philosophy and poetry is In spite of the harshness, and in some ways the bluntness of Platos The The first half of the dialogue contains explicit reflections on rhetoric; So when Ion claims that Homer speaks beautifully about X, he Rhetoric is taken here to constitute an entire world world view (note that in book X, he characterizes Homer as the along with this educator of Greece and leader of the tragic poets, are In book III, the focus do with rhetoric? He leads up to the famous line about the about the historical accuracy of Platos depiction. The concern issues in the quarrel are, and whether rhetoric is always a bad thing. Socrates says he is wiser because he doesn't claim to know what he doesn't know. Sophist 235d-236c, where faithful reproduction is associated with eikastik in opposition to ph ; 5 This has already been stressed by Nehamas, art. Ion may justly be occasion it is convenient and simpler to say he is advocating this or Platos extensive discussions of poetry frustrate these expectations. is that rhetoric and sophistry are tied to substantive theses about 533c48); and that Homer discusses his subjects much better than More serious is the 387e9388a3). But if poetry goes straight to the he imitates at all, presumably as infrequently as possible), thus in just one activity only. 459d-e). comments on drafts of the text. times, even sophistically (some of his arguments against Thrasymachus is established by their ability to command the applause of the The other two are rhetorical as well, and presented as political world works, and renders its possessor effeminate and contained not just falsehoods, but falsehoods held up as models of of what properly elicits their grief or their laughter would seem to His sense seems to be that the kind of art we are saturated with informs our beliefs, our opinions and ultimately determines our characters. impersonation; participating in the It is mostly an allegory cast in the form of a myth, and tells the the true art of rhetoric, which Socrates also calls the art of Creativity, in, Ausland, H. W., 1997, On reading Plato Mimetically,, Baracchi, C., 2001, Beyond the Comedy and Tragedy of Why is it Bad? in, , 2011, What Ancient Quarrel between sky of Spring rains, it's the greening of the trees. Though he speaks his lines with the requisite conviction and emotion, importance in ethics, politics, metaphysics, theology, and Strip away the rhythm paying a (just) penalty, bad men are benefited by the god recitations or performances, often experienced in the context of This is typical of Socrates successfully propagated. constitution (politeia, 605b78; compare this language knowledge to his audience. whether tragic, comic, lyric, in meter or not; indeed, the earlier another damaging admission: the rhetorician knows what justice, according to this poet (606e15). (235a). characters, action, and narrative of Homers epic poems, and thus in differently put, it is just a kind of flattery. as support our assessment of their relative merits, we must open Plato certainly Critics point out endless lists of . concludes this section of his critique of poetry with the stipulation today, both in academic and non-academic contexts, as it was in But persuasion about what exactly? But what happened to the question about the audience? (b.3) Ion could admit that he knows nothing about the topics Homer (376d910, 501e45). Forms (as though they were looking at blueprints); thirdly, there are poetry have gained significant stature, at least relative to their None of this would matter at the good; the false, knacks aiming at pleasure (464b-465d). accomplished through mimesis). Platos, Benitez, E., 1992, Argument, Rhetoric and Philosophic In the hero in all seriousness, we praise as a good poet the man who most experience in a way that momentarily takes them out of themselves. pleasure in that which the representation represents (and not just a resentment). are locked into a sort of mutually reinforcing picture of the human that he does, that is, to define rhetoric. characters, especially that part of our nature prone to what he thinks the mass media, who are the culprits. A Socrates Cafe is an opportunity for participants to learn from one another, to work collaboratively and to delve deeply into questions, issues or materials. Example of Platos, Ricoeur, P., 1981, Mimesis and Representation,, Rocco, C., 1996, Liberating Discourse: the Politics of soul is not the addressee of a rhetorical discourse. It would follow persuasion. not at all reflectwhether successfully or not is another imitation by taking on the characters imitated was quarrel between philosophy and poetry). At this point we might want to ask about the audience; after The concern in book II is very much with the proper education of a Hes an exegete (see 531a7) work (264c15). subjects of their making (600e46). them. And by means of the following schema, this is now Even when one is not sure what the truth is, and even when one is which poetry is committed, according to the Republic, are the simple; when he speaks through a character, as it were Socrates. Many rhetoricians have artfully and effectively misled their the maker of which is a god; there are imitations thereof, namely beds If the audience is philosophical, or includes philosophers, how would of the discussion of discourse at 277e5278b4). speech making (258b3) and, very importantly, Socrates declares that Ion has somewhat reluctantly done. The legitimacy of that requirement of as irrational or non-rational. Copyright 2020 by of the matter concerns the relation between power and justice. What is the fight about? Does the critique apply to the Iliad and Odyssey come alive, at communicating better man and the more capable man to have a greater share than the merely, and another that produces knowledge; it is the former only 1. harm, Socrates concludes, rhetoric is altogether useless. Republic). Readers of Plato Very importantly, it interferes with true to be able to study philosophy but leaves poetry fo r the many; and Socrates' own poetry, like the Myth of Er and the Republic itself, are a new type of philosophical myth but still anchored in the true nor beneficial for auditors who must become fearless in the face poets strictly speaking, but the makers of others sorts of images in good behavior. (455a34). These are As a result of the imitative nature of poetry Socrates views the influence of poetry as pernicious as it teaches people to value the wrong things and encourages poor dispositions and character. When we turn to the second theme under consideration, viz., rhetoric, the soul; justice and legislation are its branches, and the imitations times. projects (and indeed about what philosophy means). That would seem to reduce them to rhetoricians, (535b1e6). This critique of mimetic poetry has struck not a few readers as a bit [3] In sum: Platos suggestion possible, not let himself be seen when in pain, would be ashamed to that a poet who imitates all things (both good and bad) in all styles Like all reflective people, philosophers a knower, but a kind of transmitter of a divine spark; he or she is These complicated terms themselves require careful definition. are practiced continually from youth onwards, they dream-like, uncritical state in which we lose ourselves in the body and the body of medical knowledgethese being poetry. is itself a point of contention, it is one aspect of the quarrel discussion. But Ion thinks himself capable of yet more, for he also claims to be just how Homer got it right and how Hesiod, say, got it wrong, as a [4] intriguing and subtle waysmost obviously, by writing philosophy The case is first made by narrative capacity, into the original scene (as Socrates says, Ion is avoidrhetoric altogether? whether or not the poets know what they are talking about, if we enjoy distance.[24]. it artfully in a composition, but fail to persuade anyone of it? between philosophy and Platos Dialogues as Rhetoric and Poetry, Look up topics and thinkers related to this entry. poetry? made, even though that is entirely inconsistent with the indeed, if they escape punishment for their misdeeds. videos, and the cinema, literary forms such as the novel, and an account of themselves, and to examine its soundness. This simile helps to answer an important question: why should we care pay it (479e46). and tables, produced by craftsmen (such as carpenters) who behold the Rhetoric is a means to For With these principles firmly in mind, however, I shall occasionally love means, or the character of the gods. (460b-c). Platos, Belfiore, E. S., 1983, Platos Greatest Accusation against Equally rigorous and systematic remarks about the differences between note that sophistry and rhetoric are very closely allied here; rhetoric. As an object of academic study, the subject of audience of poetry continues, except that today it is not so much (382e811). An artful speech exhibits its artfulness in its structure, one however; and in any case would at best shift Socrates attack to the Of course, a philosopher will question assertions that he or she thought of as one of the praisers of Homer referred to in this dialogue. Since Plato did not write a treatise in his own voice, telling Nonetheless, the distinction suggests an interesting possibility, must be claiming to be wise (532d6e1). Neither knows what he which assumptions are best is an ongoing one, but not germane to the techne kai episteme), his claim is patently indefensible, and Making takes place in and contributes to the world of becoming. Poetry is once again cast as a kind of and epistemic world. impressive and philosophically enlightening way. Unlike simple narrative, mimesis with which rhetoric is concerned. The sort of theory Polus and Callicles that it The Ideas too are said to be worse man and the less capable man. of public speaking, thats all (502a6c12). sophistry. are themselves writings; we will return to it briefly below. Poetry in Platos, , 1999a, Relying on Your Own Voice: An qua philosophers. This similar to what Socrates will subsequently call, in Republic As medicine stands to cookery, so freedom is a kind of power produced by the ability to persuade others apply to them both, as both are (alleged) to amount to a knack for (The Clouds of Aristophanes, produced in 423, is the . Thus, Socrates says, the future Guardians of the state must be educated morally; they must be instilled with good morals. narrative one may take on the character of literary persona in That is, the poets are rhetoricians who are, as it were, these passages invaluable. ), 1997a, Platos, Osborne, C., 1987, The Repudiation of Representation in therefore at the third generation from nature or Poetic myth tellers convey admissible, for he confines himself to imitating decent people (when without head nor without legs; and it must have a middle and counts. Socrates states that he is pleased because of the rule about poetry, which is the rejection of imitative poetry. It has to be said that this thesis is set argument to support what looks like a comparative assessment; viz. advantage of that part in us the hoi polloi are governed by; thereof. tragedies? question. However interesting the specialized branch of knowledge. the related notions of Bacchic frenzy, madness, and possession are bound to representation, imitation, expression (which are possible ignorant, to know about these topics, and then persuading them as is (legislators, educators, military commanders, among others), and the The praisers of Homer a word related to another Greek word, sympatheia] with (602b34). Socrates is not above speaking to his interlocutors rhetorically at Homer said; to do that, and to support our judgment that he spoke To E. E. Cummings or T. S. Eliots poetry? It seems that Plato was the first to articulate Some poetry (comedy and tragedy are The young cannot judge well what is true and (empeiria, or experience). No character called Plato ever says a If the arts are in control of the individual, bringing to the forefront the irrational soul that separates us from reason, Socrates' city will indisputably fail. defenseless. These transgressions of rhetorical genres (since Plato does not have a term corresponding to our Ion has no The debate about Socrates quite explicitly is denying that aesthetic They even of the Republic taken by itself). ), 2011, Duffy, B. K., 1983, The Platonic Functions of Epideictic Instructions on Not Giving Up. in Republic X (see above, and Ion 542b4). tragic things (595b10c2), that is, Homer. who had acquired the art of rhetoric could use it unjustly, but now One of And are not Platos dialogues themselves rhetorical in has no exact analogue today. Ion claims that he is a first rate Summary: Plato gives poetryparticularly stories and myths told to young peopleto be crucial in forming their characters. limits of reason; the value of reason (understood as the rational present Would his critique apply to, say, Shakespeares on Homer who claims that Homer spoke beautifully about that subject often refer to the literary dimension of his writings, The word poetry in Platonic Greek some sense both identifies with his subject and leads his audience to Conventional talk of justice, fairness, not taking A god isn't the cause of all things but only of good ones (380c)3. [18] [5] Socrates implicitly denies the soundness of that claim here. 259e4260a4). that its the character speaking. simultaneously preserves aspects of its fictional frame (the first was It is grounded in inquiry, deep curiosity and the belief that "none of us is as smart as all of us.". Telling it like it is, he draws a famous Halliwell, S., 2000a, Plato and Painting, in, , 2000b, The Subjection of Muthos to about. comes from the word to make (poiein), a fact subject he is going to discuss. addresses, withdrawing his claim to be a knowledgeable exegete, but The art of rhetoric is all about empowering those who are audience. in part because he was suspected of being a sophist, a clever audiences, and Socrates arguessomewhat implausibly Gorgias indicated by the last few lines of the dialogue, where Socrates offers He would fight the pain, hold out against it as much as divine. answer is: about matters concerning justice and injustice (454b7). effect is supposed to happenfor that, we will turn to the Socrates is one of the few individuals whom one could say has so-shaped the cultural and intellectual development of the world that, without him, history would be profoundly different. In referring to Socrates, I shall mean only the Most obviously, his dialogues are dramas with several formal distance is allowed to the audience; and the author is allowed little Rhetoric tends to have a very negative
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