| Description |
1 online resource (xi, 251 pages) |
| Contents |
Intro; Contents; Acknowledgments; Prologue: Learning to Read; 1. Reading Plato; Reading, writing, fathers, and kings; How Plato wrote; Mimetic poetry; Mirrors; Representation; Resistance and self-authorization; 2. Poetry: The Measure of Truth; Alienating authority, fathers again; Poetry silenced; Forms, knowledge, looks, simulacra; Poetryâ#x80;#x99;s use; Poetryâ#x80;#x99;s reason; Poetryâ#x80;#x99;s benefit; 3. A Life without Poetry; The brothersâ#x80;#x99; desire; Warriors, guardians, dogs; Poets, founders, gods; Simple minds; Obedience, domination, calculation, injustice; An aischropolis; Justice in and by itself |
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4. The Power of PersuasionCompulsion; Deception; A grammatical interlude; Elenchos; Persuading in the middle voice; Analogy; Free and beautiful discussions; 5. ErÅ#x8D;s: The Work of Desire; Philosopher-kings, philosophers by nature, philosophical erotics; Desiring possession; Ladders, immortality, instrumentality; Genesis, reproduction in difference, belonging; Framing desire; ErÅ#x8D;s and philosophy; Necessity, tyranny, and democracy; 6. Dialectics: Making Sense of Logos; Provocatives; What do I see? or, The powers of sense perception; What do I think? or, Having an opinion |
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What do I make of it? or, Measuring, incommensurability, relationalityFraming knowledge; Impostures, images, truth; Willing to pay attention, an attitude of soul, phronÄ#x93;sis; A city in logos; Epilogue: Poetic Justice; Seeming, being, doing; Judging, appearances, imagination; No harm, one man:one art; Political philosophy; Work Cited; Index |
| Summary |
When Plato set his dialogs, written texts were disseminated primarily by performance and recitation. He wrote them, however, when literacy was expanding. Jill Frank argues that there are unique insights to be gained from appreciating Plato's dialogs as written texts to be read and reread. At the center of these insights are two distinct ways of learning to read in the dialogs. One approach that appears in the Statesman, Sophist, and Protagoras, treats learning to read as a top-down affair, in which authoritative teachers lead students to true beliefs. Another, recommended by Socrates, encourages trial and error and the formation of beliefs based on students' own fallible experiences. In all of these dialogs, learning to read is likened to coming to know or understand something. Given Plato's repeated presentation of the analogy between reading and coming to know, what can these two approaches tell us about his dialogs' representations of philosophy and politics? With Poetic Justice, Jill Frank overturns the conventional view that the Republic endorses a hierarchical ascent to knowledge and the authoritarian politics associated with that philosophy. When learning to read is understood as the passive absorption of a teacher's beliefs, this reflects the account of Platonic philosophy as authoritative knowledge wielded by philosopher kings who ruled the ideal city. When we learn to read by way of the method Socrates introduces in the Republic, Frank argues, we are offered an education in ethical and political self-governance, one that prompts citizens to challenge all claims to authority, including those of philosophy |
| Notes |
Acknowledgments Prologue Learning to Read 1 Reading Plato 2 Poetry: The Measure of Truth 3 A Life without Poetry 4 The Power of Persuasion 5 Erōs: The Work of Desire 6 Dialectics: Making Sense of Logos Epilogue Poetic Justice Works Cited Index |
| Bibliography |
Includes bibliographical references and index |
| Notes |
Print version record |
| Subject |
Plato. Republic.
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| SUBJECT |
Republic (Plato) fast |
| Subject |
Reading -- Philosophy
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Philosophy, Ancient.
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POLITICAL SCIENCE -- General.
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Philosophy, Ancient
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Reading -- Philosophy
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| Form |
Electronic book
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| ISBN |
9780226515809 |
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022651580X |
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