The Philosophers' Magazine
Debra Nails says that literary success eclipses Plato
The Philosopher King … the Academy … Atlantis … Plato’s Cave … Platonic Love … music of the spheres … the Socratic method … the Ladder of Love … Platonic Forms … Beauty is truth, truth beauty … Platonic Solids … Platonic dialectic … the Third Man … academic freedom … Plato’s Beard … footnotes to Plato …
Get your vaccinations. When you read about Plato’s teacher and his pupils, immunise yourself against authors who have imagined Plato through the lens of a modern schoolroom. When you read of Plato’s master and his disciples, inoculate yourself against authors with a different distorted lens: medieval monasteries with their religious adherents. John Dewey railed against “the artificial Plato constructed by unimaginative commentators” who regard Plato “as the original university professor”. Anyone who purports to provide you with Plato’s teachings, beliefs, or doctrines is doing you a disservice – if you are at all philosophically inclined. This is not to say that Plato was completely without beliefs of his own, but he is not a character in any of his thirty-odd dialogues, so there isn’t much we can be certain about and, if the man’s intention was to persuade others of his personal views, he was blindingly unsuccessful. Controversy sprang up even in ancient times over what Plato