The Art of Plato by R B Rutherford

The Art of Plato by R B Rutherford

The fascination of Plato's dialogues rests not only on the range of arguments and opinions expressed by the participants, but also on the richness of his literary style. He captures the imagination and stimulates the curiosity of his readers through his expert use of techniques devised by the rhetoricians and even the poets of his time; Plato, the critic of art and poetry, shows himself a consummate artist. This book is not a study of Plato's philosophy, but a contribution to the literary interpretation of the dialogues, through analysis of their formal structure, characterization, language and imagery. The dialogues considered in these interrelated essays include the Gorgias, the Symposium, the Republic and the Phaedrus. Special attention is paid to the personality of Socrates, Plato's remarkable mentor, and to his interaction with other characters in the dialogues. The book includes discussion of particular problems such as the sources for our knowledge of Socrates, the origins of the dialogue form, Plato's use of myth and the totalitarianism of the Republic.

In 1982, R.B.Rutherford was appointed Tutor at Christ Church, Oxford, where he has taught Greek and Latin literature in tutorials and lectures ever since. His published works include Greek and Latin literature and verse, epic, history, and philosophic prose in both Greek and Latin. Rutherford is the author of a Cambridge commentary on Books 19 and 20 of the Odyssey (1992), a digestible monograph on Homer (1996), and a survey of all of classical literature in fewer than 400 pages (2005), among other publications. Greek tragedy was the subject of one of his first pieces, and it has remained a source of fascination for him ever since.

SKU	Unavailable
ISBN 13	9780715629932
ISBN 10	071562993X
Title	The Art of Plato
Author	R B Rutherford
Condition	Unavailable
Binding Type	Paperback
Publisher	Bloomsbury Publishing PLC
Year published	2000-07-20
Number of pages	352
Cover note	Book picture is for illustrative purposes only, actual binding, cover or edition may vary.