A Praise of The Philosophical Written Speech? Ethics and Philosophical Progression in Plato's Symposium"

In this chapter I will focus on some relevant aspects of the first three encomiastic speeches on Love produced by Plato in the Symposium and show how each of them, followed by the two speeches uttered respectively by the poets Aristophanes and Agathon, pave the way for the content of Socrates’ account of Eros, i.e. a speech inclusive of Diotima’s revelations. I will propose that the picture of erôs which takes shape throughout the whole dialogue (a) is inextricably linked to the concept of ‘progression’, both ethical and intellectual, towards the forms of beauty and goodness; (b) presents features which can be attributed also to the literary form adopted by Plato. The Symposium, in other words, would represent a paradigmatic case of a dialogue in which arguments, although prima facie unrelated to the issue of philosophical writing, offer significant clues about the nature and philosophical import of written speeches.