32 The clearest example of this is the chicken joke at lines 659-66. Thus, love is intentional in its character. The fact that the criticism is not realistic detracts nothing from its relevance. In the writing he’s in charge of “The Thinkery”, this is a school that consists of pupils who have a materialistic take on the possible ideas of the world, however, Socrates isn’t a teacher, rather he is an “overseer”. But Socrates—as painted by Aristophanes—tries to be better than reality. In modern conditions, “the more we cultivate reason, the more we cultivate nihilism” (Natural Right and History). Reviewed in the United States on November 23, 2019. Your recently viewed items and featured recommendations, Select the department you want to search in. Help others learn more about this product by uploading a video! “Aristophanes has come very close to the truth in his depiction of Socrates.” Kierkegaard 1989 In Plato’s Apology, a version of the defense speech that Socrates delivered in 399 when he was charged with the potentially capital offense of introducing new gods and corrupting the youth of Athens, Socrates divides his accusers into two groups. In one of his last books, Socrates and Aristophanes, Leo Strauss's examines the confrontation between Socrates and Aristophanes in Aristophanes' comedies. Gu 1 Zixu Gu Zeph Scotti PHIL 025 Feb 23, 2021 Reaction Paper 1: Plato and Aristophanes on Socrates 1. Indeed, there is not even unambiguous evidence that Aristophanes condemns Socrates. Chremylos, the champion of Wealth, throws her out without having produced any reasonable answer to her arguments. (“Because they saw how limited man’s power is,” he wrote in On Tyranny, “they held that the actualization of the best regime depends on chance.”) Whether in the jester’s dress of Aristophanes or in the philosopher’s mantle of Socrates, classical political thought can only indicate what is good against all the odds. The Aristophenian Socrates had yet to learn his 'lessons'. There is no personal animosity against Socrates in Aristophanes’s Clouds. Unable to add item to List. His order is the perfect order because it is comic. “Aristophanes has come very close to the truth in his depiction of Socrates.” Kierkegaard 1989 In Plato’s Apology , a version of the defense speech that Socrates delivered in 399 when he was charged with the potentially capital offense of introducing new gods and corrupting the youth of Athens, Socrates divides his accusers into two groups. The first of many difficulties raised by this conclusion would be that Leo Strauss has never given up either the quality of being a philosopher or the quality of being a Jew. Reviewed in the United States on March 17, 2000. Thus, love is intentional in its character. Aristophanes casts Socrates as a personified synthesis of several of … Indeed the level of absurdity that Socrates is granted only suggests how much of a threat Aristophanes considered the "new education" to represent. However, Aristophanes’ characterization of Socrates is centered on how the philosopher interacted with his students. Sophists is a branch in philosophy arguing that man is a measure of everything. What Aristophanes depicts in his play 'The Clouds' is a "young" Socrates, one who does not know yet the wisdom of respecting a city's Gods. The Socrates of Aristophanes’ comedy is the head of a school that investigates every sort of empirical phenomenon, regards clouds and air as divine substances, denies the existence of any gods but these, studies language and the art of argument, and uses its knowledge of rhetorical devices to “make the worse into the stronger argument,” as the Socrates of the Apology puts it in his speech. Bring your club to Amazon Book Clubs, start a new book club and invite your friends to join, or find a club that’s right for you for free. Many philosophers have more or less expressed the same idea and have disqualified themselves as utopists. The Hard Truths of the Latest Anti-Asian Attack, Israel: Great Vaccinations, Horrible Elections, The Quincy Institute vs. John Quincy Adams. Greek philosophy covers an absolutely enormous amount of topics including: political philosophy, ethics, metaphysics, ontology (the study of the nature of being, becoming, existence, or reality), logic, biology, rhetoric, and aesthetics (branch of philosophy dealing with art, beauty, and taste). Within The Clouds, Aristophanes, a staunch traditionalist, uses Socrates as a scapegoat, criticizing him for demanding large sums of money in exchange for sophistic and scientific lessons that engendered this anti-traditional intellectual movement. What is presented in this book is a summary of all eleven of Aristophanes's plays. At the same time, Aristophanes's speech offers some important contrasts with Socrates's: the playwright's story is concrete and focused on the human dimension of love, where Socrates is characteristically abstract and wants to broaden the discussion to love of all kinds. Yet Aristophanes was a friend of Socrates. Reprint: University of Chicago Press, 1980. Looking at eleven plays, Strauss shows that this confrontation is essentially one between poetry and philosophy, and that poetry emerges as an … There Poverty, Penia, argues that we owe all the good things to her, because she makes people work. Full content visible, double tap to read brief content. The extant sources agree that Socrates was profoundly ugly, resembling a satyr more than a manand re… Be this as it may, Plato's Symposium and Republic (especially Republic X where Socrates bans the poets from his just city) tells only half the story (philosophy's side). It purports to be a record of conversations at a dinner party at which both Aristophanes and Socrates are guests, held some seven years after the performance of The Clouds, the play in which Socrates was cruelly caricatured. Plutarch, in his Moralia, quoted Socrates as saying, "When they break a jest upon me in the theatre, I feel as if I were at a big party of good friends." Admittedly, the author does a great job in summarising, and there is even a feeling of anticipation that one usually finds when reading a good novel. After reading the textbook and Plato’s writing influenced by Socrates, I realized that in the period of his life Socrates was indeed truly a threat to the Athens society, because he looked for answers that no … Silent roles Witness brought by First Creditor Students at the Thinkery Slaves to Strepsiades The dramatis personæ in ancient comedy depends on interpretation of textual evidence. Socrates himself, apparently, took no offense at his portrayal in Clouds. He tells you the picture is black and white, then he brings you in so close that it all turns gray. . Greek philosophy is known for its undeniable influence on Western thought. If Aristophanes is correct in his representation of Socrates, comedy is an alternative to philosophy. If we now return to Leo Strauss’s complementary book—The City and Man—which preceded Socrates and Aristophanes by only two years, we can assess the significance of this open verdict. This book makes you wish Strauss had done a "Hobbes and Shakespeare." In Nietzsche's book Beyond Good and Evil, one reads: "As for Aristophanes-that transfiguring, complementary spirit for whose sake one forgives everything Hellenic for having existed, provided one has inderstood in its full profundity all that needs to be forgiven and transfigured here-there is nothing that has caused me to meditate more on Plato's secrecy and sphinx nature than the happily preserved petit fait that under the pillow of his deathbed there was found no "Bible", nor anything Egyptian, Pythagorean, or Platonic-but a volume of Aristophanes. Give back his eyesight to Ploutos and all will be well. Aristophanes’ Socrates, like Plato’s, urges a self- knowledge that recognizes the distance between one’s ideal and one’s present position, and that motivates self-improvement toward that ideal. Socrates in his “Apology,” must first defend himself from the slanderous impressions from the comic play by Aristophanes, “The Clouds.” Reflections on Morality, Philosophy, and History Catholic, Orthodox, Jewish and Christian Teachings / Greek, Stoic, and Moral Philosophy / Civil Rights To calculate the overall star rating and percentage breakdown by star, we don’t use a simple average. Nietzsche would have been right in maintaining that Socrates had been shown up by Aristophanes. In his play “Phrontisterion”, Aristophanes depicts Socrates as … Instead, our system considers things like how recent a review is and if the reviewer bought the item on Amazon. Yet Aristophanes was a friend of Socrates. Plato’s Symposium ends with Aristophanes and Agathon falling asleep in the late hours while Socrates is trying to convince them that the writer of tragedies is also the writer of comedies. There is a religious implication in this warning. According to Aristophanes, philosophy is sophistic while Plato views philosophy as a noble enterprise. How could even Plato have endured life-a Greek life he repudiated-without an Aristophanes? SOME CAN UNDERSTAND THESE FELLOWS. Political wisdom means that you accept reality as it is, and at the same time laugh at it: common sense is the sense of laughing at the absurdity of what exists. Socrates and Aristophanes. Aristophanes’ uses parody in its use of myth, although as discussed previously, it is overall a serious work. Good looks and proper bearing were important to a mans political prospects, for beauty and goodness were linked in the popular imagination. You will receive a link to create a new password via email. IN MEMORY OF LUDWIG EDEBLSTEIN (1902-1965) In both Plato's Republic and Aristophanes' Clouds, Socrates denies that most men are capable of philosophy. The core of every Aristophanean comedy is something impossible of the kind indicated. Eleven of his forty plays survive virtually complete. Interesting read for we who sit the other side of Plato's Republic (i.e. Please try again. Lost your password? . Diving into the relationship between Socrates and Aristophanes. This brings us close to an historical experience so often lost in classical studies, particularly in political philosphy, the madness in the streets of Athens and the fully-formed, transcendent characters which emerge with the comic treatment. If he had not brought the greatest sacrifice, he could not have defended the Torah against the philosophers so admirably as he did in his Jewish books” (What Is Political Philosophy?). Basic Books. Explore the scintillating April 2021 issue of Commentary. One example of parodying in this section actually comes after his speech when Socrates questions Agathon about audiences and performance; this parodies Socrates’ method of questioning. Aristophanes seems to argue that all the troubles of Athens come from Ploutos’s blindness. While the introduction, conclusion and first essay (on "Clouds") is apparently anchored in an argument between philosophy and poetry, the further Strauss leaves "Clouds" behind, the more we see through his close reading of the plays, in a way we never do from the younger Plato, the cultural disintegration of Athens under the assault of the war. What shows Aristophanes’ particular genius is that his conservatism is played out not only in the overall structure of the plot, but also in the details of his jokes. III. Are Public Health Officials Trying to Drive Us Crazy? Addeddate 2020-10-20 16:09:38 Identifier socrates-and-aristophanes-strauss Identifier-ark ark:/13960/t70w80s3g Ocr ABBYY FineReader 11.0 (Extended OCR) Anything Aristophanes says must make sense in terms of Aristophanes’s own assumptions. why did the ironic, diplomatic Socrates accept his? SOCRATES IN PLATO AND ARISTOPHANES. 326 pp. The 13-digit and 10-digit formats both work. Take the Ploutos again. Indeed, Strauss seems to share some of the same convictions in regards to Aristophanes as Friedrich Nietzsche. In one of his last books, Socrates and Aristophanes, Leo Strauss’s examines the confrontation between Socrates and Aristophanes in Aristophanes’ comedies. The same kind of friendship that we also see in Plato's Republic, where Socrates attacks Thrasymachus while at the same time becoming his friend. Leo Strauss is right in reminding us that we must not assume too easily that the philosophers started the war against poetry. The speeches of Aristophanes and Socrates focus on the fact that love is the realization of the definite intention. In The City and Man Strauss states that in Plato “the impossible or a certain kind of the impossible—if treated as possible—is in the highest sense ridiculous or, as we are in the habit of saying, comical. It is the incompatibility between political wisdom and philosophy in the way that Socrates practiced it—or Aristophanes thought he did. Then you can start reading Kindle books on your smartphone, tablet, or computer - no Kindle device required. Aristophanes is not open to this charge, because he knows that he is joking. Aristophanes (/ ˌ ær ɪ ˈ s t ɒ f ə n iː z /; Ancient Greek: Ἀριστοφάνης, pronounced [aristopʰánɛːs]; c. 446 – c. 386 BC), son of Philippus, of the deme Kydathenaion (Latin: Cydathenaeum), was a comic playwright or comedy-writer of ancient Athens and a poet of Old Attic Comedy. Strauss, writes that Aristophanes personally knew Socrates (unlike for example Aristotle), and as seen in the Platonic dialogue 'The Symposium' he was also a good friend of Socrates. Some of these items ship sooner than the others. . $8.50. As Socrates was the founder of political philosophy, the consequences for the Great Western Tradition would be alarming. Even Thucydides could not quite escape the question when he brought Melians and Athenians face to face to discuss the legitimacy of annihilating the enemy. It is a great summary of Aristophanes's play for the "comedy challenged," but not much more. III. Please enter your username or email address. I was struck by inspiration today while in the place where all inspiration comes from (the shower), and decided to write down some thoughts. Excerpt: Since Socrates did not write books or speeches, we depend entirely on other men’s reports for our knowledge of the circumstances in which, or of the reasons for which, political philosophy was founded. S TRAUSS, Socrates and Aristophanes, The University of Chicago Press, Chicago - London 1980, are in parentheses. Strauss is not biased against the profane language found in Aristophanes plays and does not view Aristophanes any less of a wise man for it. Against the Platonist Burnet who claimed that “statements of fact are not funny,” Leo Strauss simply remarks: “a premise that would be true only if there were never any funny facts.”. (section, 28), Reviewed in the United Kingdom on April 21, 2019. Academia.edu is a platform for academics to share research papers. Therefore, Socrates is as much of a "personification" as Just Argument and Unjust Argument. Could it be Strauss wished to remind his followers, ever so gently, to, like, lighten up and read a good comedy, even in the Greek some labor so hard to acquire? Reviewed in the United States on June 16, 2000. Strauss has repeatedly emphasized that there are three reasons why a philosopher may not make his inner thoughts explicit: he may be reticent because he lives in times of persecution, or because “there are basic truths which would not be pronounced in public by any decent man”; or because there is a religious duty not to reveal the truth. Standards of beauty are different in different eras, and in Socratess time beauty could easily be measured by the standard of the gods, stately, proportionate sculptures of whom had been adorning the Athenian acropolis since about the time Socrates reached the age of thirty. Thus, Aristophanes attack on Socrates is not done out of hate, rather it was done in friendship. I found nothing of that sort. that he mistook Socrates as a Sophist) or that Socrates was an easy target for riducule because of his 'ugly' looks. Brief content visible, double tap to read full content. It also analyzes reviews to verify trustworthiness. The Socrates that we all know and like, emerges much later and it is the Platonic Socrates, not the Socrates that Aristophanes knew. Socrates (portrayed in the play as a petty thief, a fraud and a sophist) was one of the most distinguished philosophers of Aristophanes‘ time, and also apparently had an ill-favoured face that lent itself easily to caricature by mask-makers, and “The Clouds” was not the only play of the period to lampoon him. Agathon’s speech was more clearly comedic. He does not allow irrelevant jokes in Aristophanes. by Leo Strauss. But even so, it is not a personal incompatibility. 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