Socrates, Aristophanes, and you will Agathon are left at the rear of revealing problem and you will funny: “a portion of the area are you to Socrates was trying to prove to them the exact same boy knows (epistasthai) tips develop one another funny and you may problem, that a person who is by the activity (techne) a heartbreaking poet is actually a comical poet too” (223d26).
An accurate description, surely, of the speeches produced by the symposiasts who talk past to help you Socrates
Typical poets cannot build both funny and you will disaster, as they cybermen do not make-out of knowledge and you may hobby (techne) but off divine motivation (Ion 534c56). When they did make out off activity and you can knowledge, once they was in fact craftsmen poets, they might be able to write one another comedy and you will tragedy, once the opposites will always learnt by the same passion. Hence brand new comedic interest additionally the heartbreaking activity would need to end up being you to definitely therefore the same; just as one plus the same pastime, medicine, deals with each other sickness and you can wellness.
At the conclusion of the brand new Symposium, Alcibiades has gone out of, allegedly into the throng from Bacchic revelers, whom bust for the their existence because representatives out of his taking on love into acceptance and you can flattery of the crowd
Socrates tells us exactly what good craftsman poet can generate, the guy cannot write to us exactly what however produce. Most other Platonic spokesmen was significantly more forthcoming. “We our selves is actually poets,” the new Athenian Stranger informs us in the Regulations, “who possess towards best of all of our feature authored an emergency that is the greatest plus the best; at any rate, all of our entire constitution are created once the a replica of the best and greatest life style-ab muscles thing and that i allege is the truest problem” (817b15). Before in the same discussion, brand new Complete stranger are similarly explicit this exact same structure, regardless of if maybe not a comedy, do nonetheless embody comedic training:
A person who is going to gain standard wisdom cannot understand big things versus reading absurd ones, otherwise whatever else, even, instead its reverse. However if we are going to and acquire advantage, also towards a tiny scale, i cant feel serious and you may comical as well, and this is exactly why we need to learn how to recognize exactly what is actually ridiculous, to stop being swept up because of the all of our lack of knowledge of it towards the performing otherwise stating something ridiculous, whenever we you should never must. (816d5-e5)
The new Symposium try a disaster getting an enthusiastic analogous reasoning: it has a replica of 1 section of eg a lifestyle, particularly, what the Protagoras terminology an effective “symposium away from beautiful and you may an effective guys” who “shot for each and every others mettle during the common conflict” by the inquiring and you may reacting concerns (347d3348a9). This is one way Socrates reacts so you can Agathons speech. It’s just how Diotima converses that have Socrates. Simple fact is that sort of symposium Socrates tries to lso are-expose whenever Alcibiades “satyr-play” is gone, and also the throng from Bacchic revelers possess remaining.
In the place of new Statutes, but not, the Symposium was a funny as well, as it comes with a replica of your second-best form away from symposium described from the Protagoras-that in which you’ll find poets expose, and you may the spot where the professionals “dispute over points that cannot be centered which have one confidence” (347e17).
In the long run, Alcibiades happens having-rather adequate-an excellent flute-woman (212c5-e3; evaluate 176e6-7). And even though she doesn’t enjoy, their arrival inaugurates the newest after that refuse of the symposium toward some thing way more such as the version of symposium reviled in the Protagoras while the “good symposium out-of prominent, lewd fellows… whom, incapable of captivate each other using their own talk, create the price of flute-people, and spend huge amounts to listen to the fresh voice of flute as opposed to their unique cam” (347c4-d2). This is the part of satyr-gamble regarding Symposium-satyr images try regular in the Alcibiades address.
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