Plato as Author: The Rhetoric of Philosophy

This collection, focusing on literary aspects of the Platonic dialogues, includes stimulating and diverse essays by scholars from several different fields. Plato, the critic, satirist, and (perhaps) inventor of "rhetoric" framed his own discourse in complex ways. Republic is a mimetic text that presents a sophisticated analysis of the various types of mimesis; Phaedrus, featuring embedded exemplars of exquisite prose style, includes a severe critique of literary authorship. Texts such as these seem to demand the fullest resources of a sophisticated analysis of discourse. Essay topics include friendship and desire in the Lysis, Socratic irony in Cratylus, mystery imagery in Phaedrus, and the peculiar couch in Book 10 of Republic. Contributors include Michael Erler, David Gallop, Francisco Gonzalez, Charles Kahn, Andrea Nightingale, and Thomas Szlez?k.