Introduction to Western Literature, Lesson Three
Monday, January 23, 5th and 6th periods
Geoff is sitting behind his desk, holding his head in one hand. He stands to begin the lecture once the class has assembled, but he doesn't look very happy. He looks, in fact, somewhere between depressed and...depressed.
[LECTURE] Plato was an immensely influential classical Greek philosopher and student of Socrates. He was born in Athens in BC 427 and died in BC 347 . At the age of 40, he founded one of the earliest known organized schools in Western civilization on a plot of land in the Grove of Academe. The Academy operated until AD 529, when it was closed by Justinian I of Byzantium, who saw it as a threat to the propagation of Christianity. Many intellectuals were schooled in the Academy, the most prominent one being Aristotle.
Plato lectured extensively at the Academy, and wrote on many philosophical issues. The most important of his writings are his dialogues, although a handful of epigrams also survive, and some letters have come down to us under his name. It is believed that all of Plato's authentic dialogues survive. However, some dialogues ascribed to Plato by the Greeks are now considered by the consensus of scholars to be either suspect (for example, First Alcibiades and Clitophon) or probably spurious (such as Demodocus, or the Second Alcibiades). The letters are all considered as probably spurious, with the possible exception of the Seventh Letter.
Socrates is often a character in the dialogues of Plato. How much of the content and argument of any given dialogue is Socrates' point of view, and how much of it is Plato's, is heavily disputed, since Socrates himself did not write down his teachings. However, Plato was doubtless strongly influenced by Socrates' teachings, so many of the ideas presented, at least in his early works, were probably borrowings.
Your assigned reading was Plato's Symposium, which is a prime example of rhetorical debate: a contest in which each speech can be judged for its style and substance (and also viewed as a moral reflection of the person who delivers it), as well as an example of dialectic argument: a process of statement and counter-statement, thesis and antithesis, question and reply that leads by incremental stages to a better understanding of a particular issue and a closer approximation to the truth.
The subject of The Symposium is Love. Four viewpoints are presented: that of the characters Phaedrus (love enobles both lover and beloved) and Pausanias (there are at least two kinds or levels of love: sacred and profane), Eryximachus (true love is is a biochemical balance that yields peace of mind) and Aristophanes (love involves a primal urge for wholeness and self-completeness). In fact, The Symposium is probably the single most influential treatment of love in all of western literature. From neo-Platonism to medieval mysticism, from Augustine to Dante, from Ficino to Freud, its major insights (the identity of Beauty and Goodness; love as a set of progressive stages, successive rungs in a quest for personal immortality; love as a universal creative principle or sacred force) have shaped western ideas and attitudes at all levels of culture. Profane love is defined as the physical attraction one would feel for a lover. Sacred love is defined as a spiritual emotion, putting the beloved on a pedestal to be adored from afar.
You're all going to be treated today to a special guest lecture from Professor Cregg. She'll be speaking on oral presentation and how it differs from the written word. Your class discussion will be part of her lecture, so until she arrives, I'll take questions about the reading in general, and give you some time to begin your assigned reading for next week.
Once the lecture is finished, Geoff sits back down behind his desk and proceeds to ignore the class unless someone addresses him directly.
***Assignment for Next Week: ***
1. Write 100 words in support of one of the following viewpoints, variations on the ideas Plato presents in The Symposium:
a) there are two levels of love, sacred and profane, and both are equally valid;
b) sacred love is worthier than profane love;
c) neither sacred nor profane love are valid ideas because love is a biochemical state that has no connection to any moral or spiritual state.
2. Read Inferno.
[OOC: Watch for Professor Cregg's OCD threads, which will indicate the second half of today's class.]
Class Roster
ihatedenmark
kawalsky
izzyalienqueen
kitty__fetish
lady_jessica_bg
apocalypsesoon
harried_potter
Auditing: gotcanewillpoke
Independent Study
future_visions
kikidelivers
Geoff is sitting behind his desk, holding his head in one hand. He stands to begin the lecture once the class has assembled, but he doesn't look very happy. He looks, in fact, somewhere between depressed and...depressed.
[LECTURE] Plato was an immensely influential classical Greek philosopher and student of Socrates. He was born in Athens in BC 427 and died in BC 347 . At the age of 40, he founded one of the earliest known organized schools in Western civilization on a plot of land in the Grove of Academe. The Academy operated until AD 529, when it was closed by Justinian I of Byzantium, who saw it as a threat to the propagation of Christianity. Many intellectuals were schooled in the Academy, the most prominent one being Aristotle.
Plato lectured extensively at the Academy, and wrote on many philosophical issues. The most important of his writings are his dialogues, although a handful of epigrams also survive, and some letters have come down to us under his name. It is believed that all of Plato's authentic dialogues survive. However, some dialogues ascribed to Plato by the Greeks are now considered by the consensus of scholars to be either suspect (for example, First Alcibiades and Clitophon) or probably spurious (such as Demodocus, or the Second Alcibiades). The letters are all considered as probably spurious, with the possible exception of the Seventh Letter.
Socrates is often a character in the dialogues of Plato. How much of the content and argument of any given dialogue is Socrates' point of view, and how much of it is Plato's, is heavily disputed, since Socrates himself did not write down his teachings. However, Plato was doubtless strongly influenced by Socrates' teachings, so many of the ideas presented, at least in his early works, were probably borrowings.
Your assigned reading was Plato's Symposium, which is a prime example of rhetorical debate: a contest in which each speech can be judged for its style and substance (and also viewed as a moral reflection of the person who delivers it), as well as an example of dialectic argument: a process of statement and counter-statement, thesis and antithesis, question and reply that leads by incremental stages to a better understanding of a particular issue and a closer approximation to the truth.
The subject of The Symposium is Love. Four viewpoints are presented: that of the characters Phaedrus (love enobles both lover and beloved) and Pausanias (there are at least two kinds or levels of love: sacred and profane), Eryximachus (true love is is a biochemical balance that yields peace of mind) and Aristophanes (love involves a primal urge for wholeness and self-completeness). In fact, The Symposium is probably the single most influential treatment of love in all of western literature. From neo-Platonism to medieval mysticism, from Augustine to Dante, from Ficino to Freud, its major insights (the identity of Beauty and Goodness; love as a set of progressive stages, successive rungs in a quest for personal immortality; love as a universal creative principle or sacred force) have shaped western ideas and attitudes at all levels of culture. Profane love is defined as the physical attraction one would feel for a lover. Sacred love is defined as a spiritual emotion, putting the beloved on a pedestal to be adored from afar.
You're all going to be treated today to a special guest lecture from Professor Cregg. She'll be speaking on oral presentation and how it differs from the written word. Your class discussion will be part of her lecture, so until she arrives, I'll take questions about the reading in general, and give you some time to begin your assigned reading for next week.
Once the lecture is finished, Geoff sits back down behind his desk and proceeds to ignore the class unless someone addresses him directly.
***Assignment for Next Week: ***
1. Write 100 words in support of one of the following viewpoints, variations on the ideas Plato presents in The Symposium:
a) there are two levels of love, sacred and profane, and both are equally valid;
b) sacred love is worthier than profane love;
c) neither sacred nor profane love are valid ideas because love is a biochemical state that has no connection to any moral or spiritual state.
2. Read Inferno.
[OOC: Watch for Professor Cregg's OCD threads, which will indicate the second half of today's class.]
Class Roster
ihatedenmark
kawalsky
izzyalienqueen
kitty__fetish
lady_jessica_bg
apocalypsesoon
harried_potter
Auditing: gotcanewillpoke
Independent Study
future_visions
kikidelivers