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Socrates and the young Phaedrus walk out of Athens and sit under a plane tree by the river Ilissus, where Phaedrus reads him a clever speech on love by the…
Socrates and the young Phaedrus walk out of Athens and sit under a plane tree by the river Ilissus, where Phaedrus reads him a clever speech on love by the orator Lysias. Socrates answers with two speeches of his own, and in the second compares the soul to a charioteer driving two winged horses, one noble and one unruly.
Context and significance
The second half turns to rhetoric and writing. Socrates tells the Egyptian myth of the god who invented letters and the king who warned that writing would weaken memory, an argument that sounds surprisingly modern in the age of screens. It is one of Plato's most beautiful dialogues and a natural partner to the Symposium.
About the author
Plato (c. 428–348 BC) was born into an aristocratic family in Athens and became the devoted student of Socrates. After his teacher's trial and execution in 399 BC, he travelled, returned to Athens and founded the Academy, a school that lasted for centuries and counted Aristotle among its students.
Almost all his writings are dialogues in which Socrates questions his fellow citizens about justice, love, knowledge and the soul, from the Apology to the Symposium and the Republic. Known to Arab philosophers as Aflatun, he was read closely by al-Farabi and Ibn Rushd, and Western philosophy has been called a series of footnotes to him.