The War And Plato s Symposium, And The Man Discussed

In two very different works we see two equally different portrayals of the same man; these differences are informed by the author’s purpose, the genre of the work, and the effects of the depiction upon the rest of the specific work. These works are of course Thucydides’, The History of the Peloponnesian War and Plato’s Symposium, and the man discussed is the Athenian giant, Alcibiades of the Alcmaeonidae. The authors, of course, have their own aims and reasons for writing their works, Plato, writing an allegory on love likely to defend his teacher Socrates, and Thucydides, to inform on what he believes to be the most significant war in history. The genres of the works being philosophy and history respectively also affects the rhetoric of Alcibiades’ speech; as well as his greater portrayals in the works. It is important to note the differences in the depictions as they are significant not only to understanding the literary merit of the works, but also furt hering the knowledge with respect to the author’s motives and the state of higher opinion on a maverick of a man in the late 5th and early 4th Centuries BC in Athens. The first significant variance one must note between the author’s works is the rhetoric and aims of the speeches Alcibiades makes in the two works. In Plato’s Symposium all the major characters are at a dinner party and are giving speeches about eros, the Greek concept of love, and there is quite an awkward relationship squabble occurring between Socrates andShow MoreRelated Exploring Love in Shakespeare’s Sonnets Essay4114 Words   |  17 PagesIn Plato’s Symposium, the discussion on the nature of love between Socrates and his companions in the house of Agathon clearly discerns key ideas that Shakespeare uses in the sonnets. Beauty, youth, and love are all topics of discussion in the conversations, and Plato’s ideas show up again and again when the sonnets are explored. In Symposium, Aristophanes gives a detailed description of a time when humans were not in their present physical form (Plato 353). His tale posits that the original formRead MoreDr. Einstein And Sigmund Freud Essay1852 Words   |  8 Pagesshared between Einstein and Freud discussed the psychoanalytical aspect of war and how human character, flaw and greed affect the causes and effects of war. Einstein reached out to Freud after the First World War, as requested to do so by the International Institute of Intellectual Cooperation (IIIC), to discuss what he called a subject â€Å"calculated to serve the common interest of the League of Nations and of intellectual life.† His central argument surrounds wars between nations, international affairsRead MoreThe Evil of Politics and the Ethics of Evil10364 Words   |  42 PagesThe Evil of Politics and the Ethics of Evil Author(s): Hans J. Morgenthau Source: Ethics, Vol. 56, No. 1 (Oct., 1945), pp. 1-18 Published by: The University of Chicago Press Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2988705 Accessed: 21/09/2010 06:43 Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of JSTORs Terms and Conditions of Use, available at http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp. JSTORs Terms and Conditions of Use provides, in part, that unless you have obtained priorRead MoreEssay on the Role of Women in Ancient Greece14417 Words   |  58 Pagesthose holding political power.† See Ticchi and Vindigni (2003) for a model of endogenous constitutions, and Aghion et al. (2004) on endogenous political institutions. 8 Sparta was very democratic—for its citizens—by the standards of the time. As discussed later in this paper, all Spartan men went through the same educational system, spent adulthood as full-time soldiers, ate in military mess halls, owned estates in Messenia, and were expected to marry and have children. Indeed, the Spartans referredRead MoreMultiple Intelligences Seminar and Workshop14464 Words   |  58 Pagesteachers and school administrators. In addition to writing many more books and articles on multiple intelligences theory, Gardner has served as a consultant to a variety of school districts. The multiple intelligences movement now includes publishers, symposiums, Web sites, how-to manuals, educational consultants who consider themselves M.I. specialists, as well as a number of critics. Howard Gardner and others have revised and expanded the theory Howard Gardner, formulator of the theory, continues