... Finally, I frequently use Socrates' own word "Kallipolis" (527c2), or "be... more ... Finally, I frequently use Socrates' own word "Kallipolis" (527c2), or "beautiful city," to refer to the city he constructs in books 2-8. Al-5. This is the ... As Socrates puts it, this procedure will work because of the "likeness of the bigger in the visible structure [idea] of the lit-tler" (369a3).! ...
... as master or tyrant reappears much later during the discussion of tyranny, where it is report... more ... as master or tyrant reappears much later during the discussion of tyranny, where it is reported that "love has from old been called a tyrant" (573b ... After hearing the particulars of the "third wave" (and recall that the Greek for "wave" is kuma, which comes from the verb "to swell" and ...
This thick volume is part of the Cambridge 'companion' series, whose books, according to their pu... more This thick volume is part of the Cambridge 'companion' series, whose books, according to their publisher, are aimed at 'students and non-specialists', and whose goal 'is to dispel the intimidation such readers often feel when faced with the work of a difficult and challenging thinker'. The Cambridge Companion to Plato achieves its goal admirably. It contains 15 essays, each of which is clearly written in prose free ofjargon, technical terminology, professorial dispute, and academic posturing. Scholarly references, which are quite extensive, are relegated to the footnotes. It is obvious that the contributors have been instructed by their editor, Richard Kraut, to write in a way that will benefit students, however advanced or initiate they may be. (Nine of the authors explicitly thank Kraut for his assistance, and he himself has written a fine introductory essay, as well as a piece on Plato's Republic.
International Journal of the Classical Tradition, 2008
In this remarkably erudite work, Pierre Hadot surveys a vast terrain. Beginning with Heraclitus' ... more In this remarkably erudite work, Pierre Hadot surveys a vast terrain. Beginning with Heraclitus' wonderfully sonic fragment, "nature loves to hide" (fu/ sij kru/ ptesqai filei=), he examines twenty-five centuries of literary, pictorial, and philosophical reflections upon "the idea of nature." In Chapter One, Hadot begins with a philological exegesis of each of the three Greek words that comprise Heraclitus' aphorism. By Chapter Twenty-Three he is writing about Heidegger, Merleau-Ponty and Wittgenstein. Confronting a work of such scope, the reader must be prepared for short, sometimes clipped, sections of commentary on a prodigious number of texts. No individual work is probed in any depth, but the sum of the many parts adds up to a considerable achievement. The Veil of Isis is an impressive work of scholarship that will be useful to scholars in a variety of disciplines. Hadot organizes his monumental narrative around three mythological figures: Isis, Prometheus and Orpheus. In his "Preface" he explains what inspired this work. A German version of Alexander von Humboldt's botanical text Essai sur la géographie des plantes was published in 1807. Its dedicatory page (to Goethe) displayed an allegorical engraving in which Apollo unveils a statue of "the goddess Nature, who had emerged from a fusion between the figure of Artemis of Ephesus and that of Isis" (p. ix). Hadot reports that in a 1980 lecture he offered a commentary on this image (which is the first of seventeen pictorial figures that can be found in The Veil of Isis). Decades of elaboration led to the present volume, whose stated task is to explore "the evolution of the notion of a secret of nature, and the figure of Isis in iconography and in literature" (p. ix). Prometheus and Orpheus represent the two basic approaches that can be taken towards Isis/Nature. Under the auspices of the former, human beings receive the imprimatur to unveil her and reveal her secrets, even if doing so requires force. While this attitude is most closely associated with the dawn of
Stanley Fish responds to the question with which he titles his essay, "how Will the humanities Sa... more Stanley Fish responds to the question with which he titles his essay, "how Will the humanities Save Us?" by objecting to its implicit assumption. As he puts it, "It is not the business of the humanities to save us." What, then, do they do? Fish answers: They don't do anything, if by "do" is meant bring about effects in the world. And if they don't bring about effects in the world they cannot be justified except in relation to the pleasure they give to those who enjoy them. his voice here is not cynical, nor does he counsel despair, for he argues that it is precisely this doing-nothing, this inherent uselessness, of the humanities that brings honor to its subject. Justification, after all, confers value on an activity from a perspective outside its performance. An activity that cannot be justified is an activity that refuses to regard itself as instrumental to some larger good. The humanities are their own good. There is nothing more to say, and anything that is said…diminishes the object of its supposed praise.
... Finally, I frequently use Socrates' own word "Kallipolis" (527c2), or "be... more ... Finally, I frequently use Socrates' own word "Kallipolis" (527c2), or "beautiful city," to refer to the city he constructs in books 2-8. Al-5. This is the ... As Socrates puts it, this procedure will work because of the "likeness of the bigger in the visible structure [idea] of the lit-tler" (369a3).! ...
... as master or tyrant reappears much later during the discussion of tyranny, where it is report... more ... as master or tyrant reappears much later during the discussion of tyranny, where it is reported that "love has from old been called a tyrant" (573b ... After hearing the particulars of the "third wave" (and recall that the Greek for "wave" is kuma, which comes from the verb "to swell" and ...
This thick volume is part of the Cambridge 'companion' series, whose books, according to their pu... more This thick volume is part of the Cambridge 'companion' series, whose books, according to their publisher, are aimed at 'students and non-specialists', and whose goal 'is to dispel the intimidation such readers often feel when faced with the work of a difficult and challenging thinker'. The Cambridge Companion to Plato achieves its goal admirably. It contains 15 essays, each of which is clearly written in prose free ofjargon, technical terminology, professorial dispute, and academic posturing. Scholarly references, which are quite extensive, are relegated to the footnotes. It is obvious that the contributors have been instructed by their editor, Richard Kraut, to write in a way that will benefit students, however advanced or initiate they may be. (Nine of the authors explicitly thank Kraut for his assistance, and he himself has written a fine introductory essay, as well as a piece on Plato's Republic.
International Journal of the Classical Tradition, 2008
In this remarkably erudite work, Pierre Hadot surveys a vast terrain. Beginning with Heraclitus' ... more In this remarkably erudite work, Pierre Hadot surveys a vast terrain. Beginning with Heraclitus' wonderfully sonic fragment, "nature loves to hide" (fu/ sij kru/ ptesqai filei=), he examines twenty-five centuries of literary, pictorial, and philosophical reflections upon "the idea of nature." In Chapter One, Hadot begins with a philological exegesis of each of the three Greek words that comprise Heraclitus' aphorism. By Chapter Twenty-Three he is writing about Heidegger, Merleau-Ponty and Wittgenstein. Confronting a work of such scope, the reader must be prepared for short, sometimes clipped, sections of commentary on a prodigious number of texts. No individual work is probed in any depth, but the sum of the many parts adds up to a considerable achievement. The Veil of Isis is an impressive work of scholarship that will be useful to scholars in a variety of disciplines. Hadot organizes his monumental narrative around three mythological figures: Isis, Prometheus and Orpheus. In his "Preface" he explains what inspired this work. A German version of Alexander von Humboldt's botanical text Essai sur la géographie des plantes was published in 1807. Its dedicatory page (to Goethe) displayed an allegorical engraving in which Apollo unveils a statue of "the goddess Nature, who had emerged from a fusion between the figure of Artemis of Ephesus and that of Isis" (p. ix). Hadot reports that in a 1980 lecture he offered a commentary on this image (which is the first of seventeen pictorial figures that can be found in The Veil of Isis). Decades of elaboration led to the present volume, whose stated task is to explore "the evolution of the notion of a secret of nature, and the figure of Isis in iconography and in literature" (p. ix). Prometheus and Orpheus represent the two basic approaches that can be taken towards Isis/Nature. Under the auspices of the former, human beings receive the imprimatur to unveil her and reveal her secrets, even if doing so requires force. While this attitude is most closely associated with the dawn of
Stanley Fish responds to the question with which he titles his essay, "how Will the humanities Sa... more Stanley Fish responds to the question with which he titles his essay, "how Will the humanities Save Us?" by objecting to its implicit assumption. As he puts it, "It is not the business of the humanities to save us." What, then, do they do? Fish answers: They don't do anything, if by "do" is meant bring about effects in the world. And if they don't bring about effects in the world they cannot be justified except in relation to the pleasure they give to those who enjoy them. his voice here is not cynical, nor does he counsel despair, for he argues that it is precisely this doing-nothing, this inherent uselessness, of the humanities that brings honor to its subject. Justification, after all, confers value on an activity from a perspective outside its performance. An activity that cannot be justified is an activity that refuses to regard itself as instrumental to some larger good. The humanities are their own good. There is nothing more to say, and anything that is said…diminishes the object of its supposed praise.
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