Plato: The Great Philosophers

An excellent piece - and it was just republished this year in Williams's The Sense of the Past: Essays in the History of Philosophy.

Rather than provide a quick, closed-door set of answers to what Plato said and "meant," Williams gives a text that manages to open the issues of Plato's texts in a lively manner. Williams' text is a clearly written, engaging and interesting read. In the space of under 50 pages, he gives a fantastic overview of Platonic philosophy (indeed touching on many of the most well known themes), all the while providing subtle observations and close commentary. He examines Plato's thought in works from all 3 periods, with very insightful commentary on the works that come after the Republic. His work highlights the tensions and questions within the dialogues. Most importantly, perhaps, he interrogates the received wisdom of the "theory of the forms" to show how Plato was at work throughout his career in questioning these issues, never fully resting on a dogmatic theory. ("The dialogues are never closed or final." - Williams, 43) Williams explores tensions between Plato's thinking of the two worlds alongside his inclinations to locate the good and meaning in this world and life, and that what is more important might very well be the activity of philosophy itself rather than some full fledged doctrinal system. This is an introduction which really draws the reader in and opens Platonic thought in a lively manner. This is a valuable short text for both beginners and seasoned readers of Plato, which is a rare feat.

Plato dominates western philosophy. This minuscule introduction's first sentence says it all: "Plato invented the subject of philosophy as we know it." Though this heady and socially unacceptable field (just say "I'm a philosopher" to someone at a party) has morphed and developed in numerous ways since the days of Pericles, Plato still stands at its helm. That so many of his works survive - many of his predecessor's remain in fragments - and that the content of these works gave rise to a superstar, Socrates, likely accounts for his historic stature. And as this excellent little book points out, his works were mainly meant for reflection, not dogmatic entrenchment. They also take the form of dialogues, avoiding the turgid prose of philosophy's later years. As such, Plato remains one of antiquity's most accessible sages. Some passages are hilarious even today. But accessibility does not imply simplicity. Many of Plato's works contain mind-numbing reflections on ethics, epistemology, politics, metaphysics, and ontology. That's where this 46-page almost-a-pamphlet comes to the rescue. Bernard Williams' lucid text provides a solid foundation for some of Plato's basic and most famous ideas. The book begins with an overview of Plato. He was no professor, though the word "Academia" derives from his "Academy." He apparently had a mistrust for writing and preferred discourse, "dialectic," or just plain conversation. Writing cannot develop whereas talking can give rise to ideas in real time. His dialogues, though written, manifest this preference, using the infamous "corrupter of youth" Socrates as their centerpiece (with a few exceptions, such as "The Laws" where Socrates does not appear). Williams also writes about the dialogues' historical order, dividing them into the standard "early," "middle," and "late" periods. Historians ordered these undated works by the progression of ideas and "stylometry." The discussion then jumps into the dialogues, such as "Laches," "Protagoras," "Meno," "Symposium," and "The Republic." Topics such as the teachability of virtue, recollection of knowledge ("anamnesis"), Plato's bias against democracy, Socrates' attempted refutation of Callicles' self-interest, justice, the state, the 3 parts of the soul, and theories about how virtue gets transmitted from one generation into another get packed into the dense, but short, text. Then an enlightening exposition of Plato's famous "cave allegory" follows (Williams quotes the original passage in full), which leads right into the "Forms" (which Williams claims was never "a theory") and "the Line." This is classic Plato. Anyone trying to tackle his dialogues should have these concepts internalized. In his late works, such as "Sophist," Plato seems to refute the unchanging, eternal Forms. Refutations and criticisms abound. At book's end, when Williams lists the attributes of "great philosophers," things he claims Plato manifests in droves, he leaves off "self-criticism." Regardless,

This book comes in at a little under 50 pages (45), and like Anthony Gottlieb with "Socrates," Bernard Williams is able to cover quite a lot of ground in that short space. Because of the limits imposed by its brevity, there is not much focus on Plato's personal life, or the context within which his ideas were born. Instead there is an excellent exploration of Plato's writings that weaves through his texts and gives the reader an idea for how to approach his works. It is not meant to be a complete and thorough analysis, but as an introduction or accompaniment to Plato's dialogues, it is a valuable book(let).