BMCR 2008.11.24, Gerald A. Press, Plato. A Guide for the Perplexed

Gerald A. Press, Plato. A Guide for the Perplexed. Guides for the
Perplexed.  London/New York:  Continuum, 2007.  Pp. viii, 240.  ISBN
978-0-8264-9176-3.  $19.95 (pb).

Reviewed by S. A. Burgess, Mediterranean Centre for Arts & Sciences
([email protected])
Word count:  2487 words
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Plato: A Guide for the Perplexed (hereafter PAGP) by Gerald A. Press
(hereafter GP) aims to introduce 'non-specialist' readers to the
richness and philosophical significance of the literary qualities of
Plato, by showing that, throughout the dialogues, 'drama is a form of
argument and argument a form of drama' (5). The book is not a summary
of Plato's major works and ideas or a detailed review of all the major
dialogues, but a sustained presentation of Plato as a non-dogmatic,
open ended and dramatic writer, which challenges many of the more
established or traditional interpretations of the corpus.[[1]] After a
brief 'Introduction' outlining the argument (1-13), PAGP contains four
main sections: 'part I Background' (13-39); 'part II Sources of
Perplexity: Change' (39-146); 'part III Plato's philosophy: Permanence'
(146-185); 'part IV Help in reading and understanding Plato's dialogues
and philosophy' (185-221). Each chapter is followed by suggestions for
further reading, and the whole is followed by a glossary of Greek terms
(221-230), bibliography (231-234) and an index of dialogues, persons
and subjects (235-240).

Part I 'Background' (13-35) concentrates on contexts. Chapter 1 (13-22)
gives an introduction to Plato's life and the Academy and examines some
of the issues concerning the assembly of the Platonic corpus --
including questions of authenticity, revision and later arrangements --
as well as a brief discussion of the 'unwritten doctrines' to be found
in the letters. Chapter 2 (23-35) provides brief summaries of the
political and historical background and of selected thematic and
chronological aspects of Greek intellectual history and concludes with
a sketch of Socrates as a historical and then as a literary figure
within the works of Plato.

Part II 'Sources of Perplexity: Change' (39-146), by far the largest
section in PAGP, is divided into seven separate chapters examining
various aspects of Plato's writings that exhibit change. It begins with
a chapter (chapter 3, 39-54) devoted to the history of Platonism, which
provides a survey in summary form of the various schools of
interpretation from antiquity to the modern period. Within this survey
GP identifies and contrasts the 'open-ended...anti-dogmatic, sceptical,
aporetic or Socratic Plato' (53) advocated by the 'New' Academy with
the 'dogmatic, systematic (and for a long time Neoplatonic) Plato' (53)
of later schools, treating both views (the sceptical and the
non-sceptical interpretations) as misrepresentations of genuine
Platonic thought. He concludes with the proposal of a 'third' Plato
'whose writings and whose conception of philosophy was dramatic and
non-dogmatic' (53), that is as 'something that is more than a vague,
general guideline [and as such not sceptical] but less than a doctrinal
system [and as such not doctrinal]' (181). This view of Plato's
dialogues as non-dogmatic and of Plato's philosophy as non-doctrinal is
maintained throughout PAGP, although GP does admit that some works at
least appear to be doctrinal.  In chapter 4, for instance, he divides
the Platonic corpus into three types: (a) works which 'explicitly do
not arrive at an answer to their central question', (b) works which
'appear...to answer their main question' and (c) those that remain
'apparently inconclusive' (58). The Laws, a text which plainly appears
to be doctrinal in nature and which has consistently been viewed on the
basis of considerable evidence as a genuine work of Plato is,
surprisingly, excluded from these groups and discounted as spurious.

After drawing attention to some of the possible literary or dramatic
models for Plato's dialogues, chapter 4 (55-74) provides a summary of
the linguistic highlights of Plato, stressing the variety of literary
devices and techniques employed and in general his use of language. The
chapter concludes with a longer discussion of the dramatic aspects of
the dialogues, in which it is repeatedly emphasized that they ought to
be regarded as 'carefully crafted fictions' (64) with traceable links
to earlier and contemporary Greek literary forms. Various
interpretations of the functions of the dialogue form are discussed: as
repositories of doctrine; as a replacement for sophistic and
traditional forms of education in the sense that they offer a
redefinition of traditional moral terms; as an invented intellectual
medium designed to introduce new cultural heroes; and as imitations of
philosophy in the sense that the interplay between dramatic and
philosophical elements creates a drama of ideas in which the reader
becomes a participant. GP also examines here the more general idea that
the entire Platonic corpus can be looked at as a continuous literary or
dramatic whole.

Chapter 5 discusses Plato's use of elenchus (with extended passages of
demonstration from the Euthyphro focusing on the personal and
destructive or non-doctrinal and non-constructive nature of Plato's
argumentation) and dialectic (identifying a less-dogmatic, Platonic,
form of dialectic as opposed to a more-dogmatic, Eleatic form). These
discussions are set within a more general presentation of dialogues as
essentially open-ended in nature, in which GP stresses, again, the
non-doctrinal nature of Plato. Turning to Plato's specific use of
myths, irony and humour, chapter 6 (92-105) aims at a reconciliation of
any possible perceived conflict between the use of myth/ poetry/
literature and the use of philosophy or rational argument. It does so
chiefly by positioning the dialogues themselves as myths or stories --
we are advised to remember that 'every idea and every theory presented
in a Platonic dialogue is fictive' (98) -- containing elements from
Greek tragedy and comedy and then by identifying myth itself as a form
of argument. GP identifies the various types of myth employed by Plato
and their uses as entertainment and as imaginative expressions or
representations of difficult ideas.

Chapter 7 (106-117) catalogues the various types of irony and humour in
Plato and their uses.  Chapter 8 then looks at the more general
relation between playfulness and seriousness in the dialogues,
identifying Socrates as a 'playful' archetype, and arguing that a sense
of playfulness pervades the dialogues, both in the obviously playful
passages and in those that are less than obvious (hence even
'exceptionally serious statements...may be playful precisely in their
unusual and excessive but merely superficial seriousness' (125). GP
warns against ignoring this playful element: 'ignoring play enables
some readers to freeze Plato's thought into doctrines, but somewhat
ridiculously to miss the point' (125).

Chapter 9 (130-142) draws together the claims of the preceding three
chapters to give a presentation of the dialogues as paradoxical works
designed to invert the expectations of readers through a variety of
means, including semantic inversion (the changing use of technical and
philosophical terms and inversion of popular identifications) and the
contrast between the foreground (what is said) and background (what is
intimated, suggested) of a text in which different issues are raised
and presented. The central point is that the dialogues are not
'statements of philosophical doctrine...they are enactments of
philosophy' (138), and that they are able to enact philosophy precisely
because they 'operate through the imagination and emotions as well as
through intellect' (139).

As GP allows, however, the analysis of the preceding chapters seems
less applicable to some dialogues than to others:  a number of Platonic
works do indeed 'seem to be more "constructive"...' (81). These are the
apparently less playful dialogues referred to as type (b) above, i.e.
those that do seem to answer their central question. Included in this
group are Timaeus, Sophist and Statesman, and with slightly less
certainty, Phaedo, Symposium, Philebus and Republic -- the last of
which is said to be the most 'superficially' constructive of the
dialogues, but is intended as a 'satire on utopian thinking and an
ironic treatment of oligarchic views' (82). When approaching works
which are seemingly constructive or less playful we are told (with
specific reference to the Timaeus) that their lack of a sense of
playfulness shows that these dialogues are not really what Plato
considers to be philosophy. The absence of a playful Socrates in the
Sophist and Statesman is an indication that they are less than
seriously intended, just as it signals in the Timaeus that the dialogue
'is only to be taken as a story' (123). Though these works do contain
doctrine, GP concludes, the silence of Socrates is an indication that
they are not to be taken seriously, i.e. that they are not the genuine
products of a non-doctrinal Plato but of a doctrinal Academy: 'Socrates
sitting silently through the...presentations in Sophist, Statesman and
Timaeus is significant, though it can be debated whether it signifies
Plato's having gone beyond the limitations of the historical Socrates'
purely refutative dialectic or Plato's quietly and ironically critical
assessment of the quasi-dogmatic use to which dialectic was being put
by some members of the Academy' (132).

In Part III (Plato's philosophy: Permanence 146-181) GP turns to an
examination of those aspects of Plato which seem to 'exhibit
permanence' (8). He maintains that Plato's philosophy is neither a
fixed set of doctrines nor a set of doctrines which change or develop
over time, 'but something more general and differently focused' (146):
Plato's philosophy is 'something that is more than a vague, general
guideline but less than a doctrinal system' (181).

Chapter 10 examines the 'problem' of Platonic anonymity, and concludes
that it is 'an indication of Plato's conception of philosophy as
non-dogmatic and as teaching indirectly through enactment' (158). In
chapter 11 (159-171), GP continues to develop his view of Plato's
philosophy as a process, characterised as a vision, rather than as a
set of doctrines, by arguing that though there are some stable
principles (such as the immortality of the soul) and some central
concerns (moral and political), to which Plato may or may not have been
committed and which may or may not have expressed through
Socrates,[[2]] these are 'introduced but never fully defined' (165),
and always remain 'open to objections and reconsiderations' (154). One
of the principles GP analyses in accordance with his open-ended view of
Plato's thought is the theory of Forms, in which reality is divided
into two levels (more traditionally viewed as two worlds). GP argues
that problems of interpretation of this central idea have arisen from
ignoring the provisional nature of Plato's thought, an error which has
led to 'the rigid, and slightly ridiculous, two-worlds metaphysics that
is found in many books' (163). (It is not made clear how the two level
model differs from a two world model.) Plato 'does not mean to say that
reality is divided into two "realms" utterly separated from each other
and about which we can make various true statements. Rather he
envisions a world existing simultaneously at two levels.' The ideal is
'there to be seen with the eyes of the soul through the real' (163).
The remainder of the chapter concentrates on defining dialectic as a
problem-solving tool which transcends ordinary oppositions and thus
provides Plato with a third way between such opposites.[[3]]

Part III concludes (chapter 12, 172-181) with the presentation of
Platonic philosophy as a path in which 'the journey is the end sought'
(174). Rather than a set of doctrines Plato's philosophy is seen as
something that is essentially open-ended, something that 'seeks to
inculcate orientations, attitudes and practices, not specific beliefs'
(151). This point is expressed through a consideration of the dialogues
as dramatic stories as, 'enactments' of philosophy, as a path or
process and not as repositories of doctrine. GP identifies three stages
within this drama, or within the path of the would-be philosopher, from
(a) the pre-philosophical which leads, through dialectical
cross-examination, to the (b) 'spiritual crisis' of aporia and finally
to the (c) open ended spiritual ascent that follows conversion from
sensation to thought.

The final part of PAGP contains advice (chapter 13, 185-208) on how to
read a Platonic dialogue as well as brief summaries of selected works.
GP identifies three steps or readings of a Platonic dialogue:

(a) The logical reading, concentrating on the 'foreground or surface
level dialectical argument' (185), in which the reader attempts to
identify the apparent conclusion; the sub-arguments; the presence of
apparent fallacies or logical errors and the overall structure of
argumentation.

(b) The literary or dramatic reading, designed to grasp the 'background
or deeper level of the dialogue's dramatic and literary aspects' (185),
in which the reader attempts to identify such features as: contextual,
literary and dramatic elements (including dramatic date), narrative
structure, depth and chronology, characters, historical connections,
physical setting, overall plot, references and allusions, physical
action, humour and irony, prologues, interruptions, digressions, and
the significance of the first and last lines.

(c) The integrative reading, which combines (a) and (b) into a 'more
complete understanding of the dialogue as a philosophical enactment'
(186), by identifying the ways in which the drama may be used to
clarify, intensify, counterbalance or invert something in the argument,
on the hypothesis that 'Plato has constructed the relationship between
the arguments and the stories deliberately and carefully' (191). With
this final reading, as with the literary reading, '[t]here is no right
or wrong answer, but readings can be better or worse, depending on how
the logical structure is explained in co-ordination with literary and
dramatic features...it is a matter of judgement or intuition' (192).
These three readings are then applied to a section of the Meno
(70a-74b, printed in full). On the question of whether these three
reading are to be performed consecutively or simultaneously, GP admits
that 'while it is practicable for one to read the Euthyphro or Crito
three times, it is quite impractical for us to reread the Republic in
that way because it is so much longer' (207). GP also admits that this
three part system is not readily applicable throughout, noting that
some dialogues are richer in dramatic detail than others, and that some
dialogues (Timaeus, Statesman, Sophist, Philebus and Parmenides)
'contain more sustained, complex and seemingly constructive (or
didactic) information' (207).

Chapter 14 (209-220) contains very brief summaries of a selected
number of dialogues in dramatic order, including Parmenides, Charmides,
Laches, Hippias Major, Symposium, Timaeus, Phaedrus, Gorgias, Meno,
Theaetetus, Euthyphro, Sophist, Politicus, Apology, Phaedo -- all of
which are approximately half a page in length -- Ion, Crito -- both of
which are less than half a page -- and Republic -- the longest at
almost two pages.

Throughout the book GP presents a singular view of Plato as
non-dogmatic, open ended, playful and dramatic or 'Socratic' and a
method or approach which is admitted to be less applicable to Plato's
'seemingly constructive (or didactic)' (207) works. So perhaps it is
not surprising that when GP encounters genuine Platonic works where
Socrates is not the leading character and which are less open-ended or
appear to contain positive doctrine, he either discounts these texts as
inauthentic (Laws) or treats them as non-serious or ironic. In sum,
though PAGP is a rich source of information about contemporary
approaches to the corpus and would be a suggestive companion for
students who are already familiar with more traditional approaches to
Plato, this is not a book intended to provide an explanation or summary
of Plato's dialogues or of his doctrines for beginners.[[4]]

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Notes:


1.   PAGP is an excellent source of reference to these approaches but
see especially  Studies in Plato's Two-Level Model (Helsinki 1999), by
H. Thesleff (to whom this book is dedicated).

2.   'Plato's vision is expressed in general principles to which
Socrates is consistently committed' (163) and, more generally, 'Such
beliefs are often identified as Plato's doctrines...and Plato may have
actually held them. On the other hand they may simply be views and
arguments that he found interesting. Or perhaps they were thought
experiments which Plato took seriously, but expressed playfully in
fictional dialogues instead of asserting any as doctrines.' (165)

3.   This analysis of dialectic as a third way is applied to Plato's
metaphysics in general. 'There seems to be an antinomy between the
Heraclitean view that nothing exists except sensible material things
that are always changing and the Parmenidean view that only a single
unchanging, rational entity exists. Transcending these oppositions is
the implicit Platonic two-level vision, often mistaken for a doctrine,
of a changing, sensible, material reality thoroughly penetrated by an
unchanging, immaterial reality that is different, higher and
intelligible rather than sensible.' (169)

4.   For such content see W.K.C. Guthrie, History of Greek Philosophy
vols. 3.2, 4 and 5 (Cambridge 1971-8) or C. J. Rowe, Plato (London
2003, second ed.).