Symposium (Oxford World's Classics) [Paperback]

Plato (Author), Robin Waterfield (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0192834274 | ISBN-13: 978-0192834270 | Publication Date: July 9, 1998

In his celebrated masterpiece, Symposium, Plato imagines a high-society dinner-party in Athens in 416 BC. The guests--including the comic poet Aristophanes and Plato's mentor Socrates--each deliver a short speech in praise of love. The sequence of dazzling speeches culminates in Socrates' famous account of the views of Diotima, a prophetess who taught him that love is our means of trying to attain goodness, and a brilliant sketch of Socrates himself by a drunken Alcibiades, the most popular and notorious Athenian of the time. Engaging the reader on every page, this new translation conveys the power, humor, and pathos of Plato's creation and is complemented by full explanatory notes and an illuminating introduction.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"A brilliant translation that gives new life to a classic. The introduction alone is worth the price of the text. Waterfield brings grace and style to the Symposium, brushing away the dust that pollutes the inferior, dead translations of the past."--William McTaggart, Westminster College

"The translation is quite good, remaining faithful to the original while flowing smoothly for the modern reader."--Ancient Philosophy

"Waterfield's translation is scholarly, yet in touch with the ZEITGEIST. More accessible than its predecessors, students will benefit from the refreshingly new tone of the introduction and translation. The notes and the index of names also add a fresh level of usefulness and a measure of charm."--Elf S. Raymond, Sarah Lawrence College

"Great. Superb notes. Informative but not pedantic."--Professor John R. Lenz, Drew University

"[The] introductory material is lucid and well-chosen."--Bryn Mawr Classical Review

"I like full Intro., marginal ref. numbers, excellent notes, size, and comfortable binding."--Madonna R. Adams, Pace University

"Waterfield's editions in the World's Classics series are superlative. Lucidly translated, his notes of explanation are, additionally, useful both to novice and to scholar."--Verna V. Gehring, Hood College

Language Notes

Text: English (translation)
Original Language: Greek --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 160 pages
• Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA (July 9, 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0192834274
• ISBN-13: 978-0192834270
• Product Dimensions: 7.5 x 5 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (13 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #273,224 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

16 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Symposium in Greek, March 21, 2000

By 

J. C. Woods "silvannus" (Malden, MA USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Plato: Symposium (Cambridge Greek and Latin Classics) (Greek Edition) (Paperback)

There are three good commentaries I know of on the Symposium. There is Rosen's, whose virtue is scholarly depth. Allen's, which unlike Rosen's, is good as an introduction and for those who simply want to enjoy the Symposium without getting entangled in scholarship. Finally there is this one, whose primary virtue is as a commentary of the Greek. This book, unlike Allen's, contains no English translation. If you want to read Symposium in Greek and need help or if you want to look up various terms in Greek, this is the book for you. If, on the other hand, you don't read Greek, or are uninterested in Greek there is a high likelihood you will be disappointed by this book.

10 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Socrates on the Nature of Love, Over Drinks, November 26, 1999

By 

Quintus Rex "Quintus Rex" (Princeton, NJ USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Symposium (Penguin Classics) (Paperback)

This is perhaps the most enjoyable of Plato's dialogues, and one of the most enduring.

Plato imagines his mentor Socrates, the comic playwright Aristophanes, and other Athenian luminaries of the Golden Age met for a dinner party and a night of discussion on the nature of love. The various guests present their positions in manners ranging from thoughtful to hilarious, but all of this is but an appetizer for the main course: Socrates' concept of Eros as the fuel for the soul's ascent to the Divine, as revealed in Socrates' reminiscence of his own mentor, Diotima, the woman of Mantinea. At the end, a drunken Alcibiades breaks in upon the festivities to reveal Socrates as an avatar of the very divine Eros which he praises.

Robin Waterfield's Oxford translation is one of the best. He captures each speaker's individual idiom, a major translational feat in itself. That he is able to do so and also render the text into lucid modern English is a further coup. The Oxford edition also includes an extensive introduction, very helpful notes, and a complete bibliography.

The Symposium is great philosophy, great literature, an intimate peek at the social life of one of western civilization's formative eras, a work of spiritual inspiration and transformation, and, not least, a wonderful read. Most highly recommended!

23 of 31 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Wit and Wisdom of Love, November 10, 2000

By 

mp - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Symposium (Penguin Classics) (Paperback)

Plato's "Symposium" will always be read because there will always be people who question the nature of Love. Agathon's dinner party is the scene of a conversation between a small group of men, who go around the table offering their views on Love. What does Love mean to us to-day? Reading over the responses of the dinner-guests and their host, we find the same range of answers in Ancient Greece that we are likely to find now.

Phaedrus and Pausanias are utilitarians and materialists. Phaedrus looks at love between people and a proto-Burkean love for government and state. Pausanias complicates the argument, saying that there are two different kinds of love, one which is common and one which is heavenly - yet still oriented towards the real and the tangible. Eryximachus is a proto-Swedenborg, trying to reconcile or harmonize the two kinds of love.

The jewels of Plato's "Symposium" are Aristophanes and Socrates. Aristophanes gives us the profoundly moving depiction of Love as a fundamental human need, a desire for completion. For a writer of comedy, whose aim as an art form is forgiveness and acceptance, Aristophanes's explanation is no surprise, though its depth is amazing. While women are generally discounted throughout the "Symposium," not only does Socrates, as we might expect, completely astound his audience (both inside the book and out) with his progressively logical and ascendant view of Love, but he also does it through the voice of a woman, Diotima. When we realize that Socrates is a character in this fiction, and that his words originate in a woman, the egalitarianism and wisdom of Plato the author truly shines forth, like the absolute beauty he claims as the ultimate goal of Love.

Was Plato a feminist? I don't know. I do know that the "Symposium" is a tremendous book. I picked it up and did not stop reading it until I was finished. The style of the Penguin translation is smooth, with a lighthearted tone that can make you forget that you are reading philosophy. Plato's comedic masterpiece in the "Symposium" is the character of Alcibiades, who provides the work a fitting end. Get the "Symposium" and read it now. You cannot help but Love it...in a Platonic sort of way.