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Nonostante Platone. Figure femminili nella filosofia antica
This book makes an important intervention in contemporary feminist theory. Cavarero takes four figures from ancient Greek texts and reinterprets them using theories of sexual difference.
- GenresPhilosophyFeminism
144 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1990
13 people are currently reading
290 people want to read
About the author
Adriana Cavarero
30 books93 followersAdriana Cavarero teaches philosophy of politics at the University of Verona, Italy, and is a visiting professor at New York University. Her field of research includes classical, modern and contemporary thought, with a special focus on the political significance of philosophy. Two main concerns shape her approach to the Western philosophical tradition. First, the 'thought of sexual difference', a theoretical perspective that enables the deconstruction of Western textuality from a feminist standpoint. Second, the thought of Hannah Arendt, reinterpreted in its most innovative categories: birth, uniqueness, action and narration. The result is an inquiry that foregrounds the individual and unique existence of the human being, as related to body and gender. Cavarero resists both the solitary abstraction of the philosophical Subject, and the volatile fragmentation of the postmodern subject, in the name of the living uniqueness of a self being generated through plural relationships with other human beings, and the acceptance of the constraints of individuality and the body.
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Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
April 30, 2021
Scholars have been interrogating and interpreting classical Greek philosophy since Roman times. This book fits very comfortably in that scholarly tradition and offers a truly exciting clarification of the way the Greeks, especially Plato, though perhaps #notallGreeks, saw things. As it happens, it also fits into a feminist tradition, one aspect of which is the temptation to assume that this is consequently of interest only to women and need not be incorporated into the wider tradition. If so, then mainstream philosophy can only be diminished, because it would be sustaining an unchallenged tradition of misogynistic sexism which is incompatible with a search for truth or even relevance.
Cavarero unpicks and dissects that misogyny with exquisite wit but it is not at all unusual to point out Plato’s (and the Greeks’) systematic sexism, with women and slaves excluded from the status of citizens or even educated adults. The point of its analysis by Cavarero and other feminist philosophers is to show that this is no superficial quirk or accidental attribute of an otherwise profound and universally valid system; it’s a fundamental defect, a systematic flaw and its pretensions to universal validity are no longer sustainable on the terms proposed. These are ambitious claims and cannot be resolved indefinitely by partitioning philosophy into feminist work in a less visited annexe, mainstream philosophy in the more public part of the edifice. The contrast is not between feminist (marginal) and mainstream (universal) but between feminist and misogynist. Long before feminists had an axe to grind, male philosophers were grinding their hostility to women into a fine art.
A charge Cavarero (or her supporters) has to rebut is that she might be engaged in a form of archaism, projecting modern anxieties and debates back into an ancient and very different world. This is an academic vice that can be seen in many other writers but it is not a valid complaint here. First, she gives an accurate account of the chosen classical works and her readings strengthen our appreciation of those works; this is indeed the task she sets herself here and is a good enough reason to value her contribution. Secondly, their influence on secular philosophy, as well as Christianity, Judaism and Islam, has been profound and long lasting, although tracing that influence is not a task in this book. Thirdly, there are influential advocates today for the same misogynistic ideas, argued in very similar if not identical terms; again, this is implied and not unpacked in this book. There is no need for her to spell out these implications. Once Plato is examined and explained in the terms of this book it is difficult to avoid seeing his legacy in its light, bearing in mind Whitehead’s remark that Western philosophy is a footnote to Plato.
Classical Greek philosophy builds many of its insights on myths and legends, with frequent reference to Homer and Hesiod and a remarkable theatrical tradition. To a degree they are used as thought experiments or models. This is a device permitting huge flexibility and creativity but it is a game that women can play too and it is difficult to restrict the range of allusions and interpretations which are already baked into classical mythology to purely orthodox and compliant readings. When Cavarero takes these iconic stories and shows that they permit radically different readings, it is tempting to push away her reflections as self indulgent storytelling, or missing the point, or just wrong because that is not what Plato intended, or just generally blasphemous and disrespectful but she really is just replying to Plato and the Greeks on their own terms and using their own methods to expose defective lines of reasoning.
The myths and legends of any society represent accumulated wisdom and are unlikely to remain the possession of any one faction, least of all any one sex. Cavarero demonstrates that Greek mythology retains in plain sight the irrepressible wisdom of Greek women and their ongoing resistance to male oppression. Greek philosophy is, to her, a crime scene and the evidence of matricide is never far from sight. The outrageous project in Plato's dialogues is to eliminate male dependence on women, to write women’s power out of the story of Greek and even human culture, but against this she picks out the transmission of female wisdom from mother to daughter in an unbroken chain through countless generations as a samizdat culture of dissent built on a female power that is out of male control and which men fear and resent. At the core of every story in which Plato seeks to silence them, there is a woman’s voice present to demonstrate the futility of his ambition.
Quotes:
Socrates is an expert in the maieutic method, the art of the midwife who does not “insert” notions into the soul of the listener but rather helps souls give birth to a truth that they already carry within them… the works of Plato and Socrates seem marked by a mimetic desire for female experience. The pregnant, birth-giving male, like the male who practices midwifery, stands as the emblematic figure of true philosophy. [92]
The primary locus and precondition of all other power is to be found in the Great Mother, from whom every man and woman originates by nature and by birth, since in order to be good, rich, noble, honoured and beautiful one must at least be there. One must be living, one must already have been born [105]
Starting in the “here and now,” as is necessary and inevitable, from the standpoint of the individual living human, I would describe the central axis of this order .. as a looking back towards the past: towards a root that bears the sign of its origin, rather than forward, anticipating, planning and projecting limits, as well as the obsession with transcending the individuality of mortal life. … it is indeed evident that the backward gaze of the human individual encounters first of all his or her own birth in the figure of a mother who brought him / her into the world. Female sexual difference, in its aim of recovering meaning, becomes visible here in such a way as to prevent universal / neutral Man from finding a meaningful space on the stage in any important scene. … The mother is in many ways a threshold between the full and irreducible concreteness of each and every living person and the world from which individuals come and are shaped; a world which already exists, before and even despite their individuality. … The theoretical possibility of not being here at all, of not having been born, … draws the gaze backwards towards the infinite chain of mothers. Each one forms a link in a sequence of births that might not have existed or might have existed otherwise… every mother is a conduit for the vibrant process of pure life and the undeniable individuality of those born from her. [117 - 119]
Cavarero unpicks and dissects that misogyny with exquisite wit but it is not at all unusual to point out Plato’s (and the Greeks’) systematic sexism, with women and slaves excluded from the status of citizens or even educated adults. The point of its analysis by Cavarero and other feminist philosophers is to show that this is no superficial quirk or accidental attribute of an otherwise profound and universally valid system; it’s a fundamental defect, a systematic flaw and its pretensions to universal validity are no longer sustainable on the terms proposed. These are ambitious claims and cannot be resolved indefinitely by partitioning philosophy into feminist work in a less visited annexe, mainstream philosophy in the more public part of the edifice. The contrast is not between feminist (marginal) and mainstream (universal) but between feminist and misogynist. Long before feminists had an axe to grind, male philosophers were grinding their hostility to women into a fine art.
A charge Cavarero (or her supporters) has to rebut is that she might be engaged in a form of archaism, projecting modern anxieties and debates back into an ancient and very different world. This is an academic vice that can be seen in many other writers but it is not a valid complaint here. First, she gives an accurate account of the chosen classical works and her readings strengthen our appreciation of those works; this is indeed the task she sets herself here and is a good enough reason to value her contribution. Secondly, their influence on secular philosophy, as well as Christianity, Judaism and Islam, has been profound and long lasting, although tracing that influence is not a task in this book. Thirdly, there are influential advocates today for the same misogynistic ideas, argued in very similar if not identical terms; again, this is implied and not unpacked in this book. There is no need for her to spell out these implications. Once Plato is examined and explained in the terms of this book it is difficult to avoid seeing his legacy in its light, bearing in mind Whitehead’s remark that Western philosophy is a footnote to Plato.
Classical Greek philosophy builds many of its insights on myths and legends, with frequent reference to Homer and Hesiod and a remarkable theatrical tradition. To a degree they are used as thought experiments or models. This is a device permitting huge flexibility and creativity but it is a game that women can play too and it is difficult to restrict the range of allusions and interpretations which are already baked into classical mythology to purely orthodox and compliant readings. When Cavarero takes these iconic stories and shows that they permit radically different readings, it is tempting to push away her reflections as self indulgent storytelling, or missing the point, or just wrong because that is not what Plato intended, or just generally blasphemous and disrespectful but she really is just replying to Plato and the Greeks on their own terms and using their own methods to expose defective lines of reasoning.
The myths and legends of any society represent accumulated wisdom and are unlikely to remain the possession of any one faction, least of all any one sex. Cavarero demonstrates that Greek mythology retains in plain sight the irrepressible wisdom of Greek women and their ongoing resistance to male oppression. Greek philosophy is, to her, a crime scene and the evidence of matricide is never far from sight. The outrageous project in Plato's dialogues is to eliminate male dependence on women, to write women’s power out of the story of Greek and even human culture, but against this she picks out the transmission of female wisdom from mother to daughter in an unbroken chain through countless generations as a samizdat culture of dissent built on a female power that is out of male control and which men fear and resent. At the core of every story in which Plato seeks to silence them, there is a woman’s voice present to demonstrate the futility of his ambition.
Quotes:
Socrates is an expert in the maieutic method, the art of the midwife who does not “insert” notions into the soul of the listener but rather helps souls give birth to a truth that they already carry within them… the works of Plato and Socrates seem marked by a mimetic desire for female experience. The pregnant, birth-giving male, like the male who practices midwifery, stands as the emblematic figure of true philosophy. [92]
The primary locus and precondition of all other power is to be found in the Great Mother, from whom every man and woman originates by nature and by birth, since in order to be good, rich, noble, honoured and beautiful one must at least be there. One must be living, one must already have been born [105]
Starting in the “here and now,” as is necessary and inevitable, from the standpoint of the individual living human, I would describe the central axis of this order .. as a looking back towards the past: towards a root that bears the sign of its origin, rather than forward, anticipating, planning and projecting limits, as well as the obsession with transcending the individuality of mortal life. … it is indeed evident that the backward gaze of the human individual encounters first of all his or her own birth in the figure of a mother who brought him / her into the world. Female sexual difference, in its aim of recovering meaning, becomes visible here in such a way as to prevent universal / neutral Man from finding a meaningful space on the stage in any important scene. … The mother is in many ways a threshold between the full and irreducible concreteness of each and every living person and the world from which individuals come and are shaped; a world which already exists, before and even despite their individuality. … The theoretical possibility of not being here at all, of not having been born, … draws the gaze backwards towards the infinite chain of mothers. Each one forms a link in a sequence of births that might not have existed or might have existed otherwise… every mother is a conduit for the vibrant process of pure life and the undeniable individuality of those born from her. [117 - 119]
April 21, 2022
This is a challenging book of feminist philosophy. I don't purport to have understood all of it. At times I got lost, and for personal reasons I took long breaks between reading it that made it hard to keep all of the book's points in my mind. Nevertheless, it is a really interesting read and one that I would recommend. Cavarero attempts to "rewrite" ancient philosophy in less misogynistic terms. To do so, she must wrest many female models from the misogynistic philosophical framework of Plato (hence the title). You don't need to have read all of Plato to understand this text, but a basic familiarity with some of Plato and with other important texts like the Homeric Hymn to Demeter and Homer's Odyssey help a lot.
This book isn't as abstruse as it might seem at first. Cavarero engages with issues like abortion, misogyny in science and philosophy, and the socialization of women. One of her key arguments is that male philosophers have always been so obsessed with death that they fail to see the feminine wisdom contained within birth. And when they do, they appropriate it for male ends, the way Plato does at the end of the Symposium. (The section on Plato's "womb envy" is stellar!) As a result, Cavarero produces a female-centric way of envisioning "mankind" but one that doesn't slip into the odd hagiography of motherhood that you find in other femininist philosophers like Kristeva. Here's a great sample from near the end of the book:
This book was recommended to me as a way to frame some research I am doing about women in ancient philosophy, and if you have any interest in ancient philosophy and (/or) gender, then you might get something good out of this book. I recommend it in particular if you have ever enjoyed reading Page duBois.
This book isn't as abstruse as it might seem at first. Cavarero engages with issues like abortion, misogyny in science and philosophy, and the socialization of women. One of her key arguments is that male philosophers have always been so obsessed with death that they fail to see the feminine wisdom contained within birth. And when they do, they appropriate it for male ends, the way Plato does at the end of the Symposium. (The section on Plato's "womb envy" is stellar!) As a result, Cavarero produces a female-centric way of envisioning "mankind" but one that doesn't slip into the odd hagiography of motherhood that you find in other femininist philosophers like Kristeva. Here's a great sample from near the end of the book:
The threshold between the animal and the human realm leaps to our eyes when viewed from a perspective that regards birth as the wellspring of human life through a maternal continuum that stretches back in time in an infinite succession of mothers. In a distant time--the indeterminable past of humankind--the link between the two realms has imperceptibly erased its own foundation in the maternal continuum.As I said, it is a bit dense to read, but the insights are profound, and your struggle to keep up is rewarded. This kind of feminist philosophy rings so much more true to me than the stuff that is built upon a heap of Lacanian terminology.
This book was recommended to me as a way to frame some research I am doing about women in ancient philosophy, and if you have any interest in ancient philosophy and (/or) gender, then you might get something good out of this book. I recommend it in particular if you have ever enjoyed reading Page duBois.
January 7, 2023
“Precisamente è questa la mia tecnica di furto, rubare figure femminili al contesto lasciando che il tessuto lacerato lasci intravedere i nodi su cui si regge la sua trama concettuale occultante”.*
Come definito dall'autrice stessa, il libro risulta gaio, spregiudicato e irriverente, una lettura che ben analizza e trasporta il lettore in una nuova prospettiva di quattro note figure femminili. Da una prima lettura si può notare come ogni singolo vocabolo è ben studiato, niente è lasciato al caso in nessun punto del libro: questo è accentuato da scelte linguistiche come l'utilizzo di periodi corti e d'effetto e figure retoriche (“La vedo, la vedo” Penelope pag.31) Ogni accortezza necessaria per raggiungere una spiegazione precisa e delineata è stata applicata, offrendo così al lettore un libro completo e conciso. Ho trovato il libro apparentemente difficile alla comprensione, in quanto bisognasse rifiutare e mettere da parte la visione tradizionale di questa donne in quanto fin troppe impregnate e macchiate dal patriarcato. Anche se, terminata la lettura, potevo comprendere e ben distinguere le due interpretazioni delle figure (convenzionale-Cavarero) non so dire quale sia la più corretta o nemmeno affermare che esista. Che sia la prima, la seconda o una fusione delle due, certamente la Cavarero offre diverse tesi a favore del suo pensiero e convince il lettore con i suoi ragionamenti
Come definito dall'autrice stessa, il libro risulta gaio, spregiudicato e irriverente, una lettura che ben analizza e trasporta il lettore in una nuova prospettiva di quattro note figure femminili. Da una prima lettura si può notare come ogni singolo vocabolo è ben studiato, niente è lasciato al caso in nessun punto del libro: questo è accentuato da scelte linguistiche come l'utilizzo di periodi corti e d'effetto e figure retoriche (“La vedo, la vedo” Penelope pag.31) Ogni accortezza necessaria per raggiungere una spiegazione precisa e delineata è stata applicata, offrendo così al lettore un libro completo e conciso. Ho trovato il libro apparentemente difficile alla comprensione, in quanto bisognasse rifiutare e mettere da parte la visione tradizionale di questa donne in quanto fin troppe impregnate e macchiate dal patriarcato. Anche se, terminata la lettura, potevo comprendere e ben distinguere le due interpretazioni delle figure (convenzionale-Cavarero) non so dire quale sia la più corretta o nemmeno affermare che esista. Che sia la prima, la seconda o una fusione delle due, certamente la Cavarero offre diverse tesi a favore del suo pensiero e convince il lettore con i suoi ragionamenti
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June 6, 2025un parto durato 4 giorni; devo metabolizzare, ma lei assolutamente brillante e dirompente – la tesi del matricidio all'origine della cultura occidentale + la ricentralizzazione della categoria di nascita mi hanno sconvolto per sempre (anche se continua a piacermi la filosofia come vivere per morire, ma credo anche a lei).
🚩bisogna stringere molto forte i denti per (l'abuso di "appunto" e) il binarismo cisnormativo strutturale (che, in partenza, si rifiuta di vedere le soggettività intersex) che è un po' il mio problema col pensiero della differenza sessuale.
🚩bisogna stringere molto forte i denti per (l'abuso di "appunto" e) il binarismo cisnormativo strutturale (che, in partenza, si rifiuta di vedere le soggettività intersex) che è un po' il mio problema col pensiero della differenza sessuale.
January 21, 2025
Mother
(and i mean it because after Adrienne Rich, Cixous and Angela Carter, i bow down to her)
(and i mean it because after Adrienne Rich, Cixous and Angela Carter, i bow down to her)
January 8, 2021
Öncelikle yabancı dillerde yazılmış felsefî metinleri Türkçede okumanın belli başlı zorlukları bu kitapta da mevcut. Kimi kavramlar ve bazı kelime seçimleri Türkçeye o kadar yabancı ki, anlamdaki zorluk orijinal metinden mi kaynaklanıyor yoksa çeviri ile ilgili bir problem mi var, anlamak zorlaşıyor. Kimi noktalarda italik yazılmış kelimelerin göndermelerini anlamak neredeyse olanaksız.
Cavarero'nun metnini rahat okumak için temel antik felsefe terimlerine, hâkim değilse de, aşina olmak gerekiyor. Genel hatlarıyla Platoncu felsefe ve idealar dünyası konseptleri ile ilgili fikir sahibi olmak da okuyanın işini kolaylaştıracaktır. Kitabın hedef kitlesi "konuya yabancı ortalama okuyucu" değil zannederim.
Temel olarak cinsel farkın Platoncu felsefede reddi, anne katli penceresinden, Platon metinlerinde satır aralarında kalmış kadın karakterlere alternatif okuma yaparken doğum, kürtaj hakkı, idealar dünyasının erkek/insanı üzerinde durulmuş. Özellikle son iki bölümdeki tespitleriyle, antik Yunan felsefesinin, sözgelimi, günümüz Türkiyesinde nasıl yansıdığını izlemek mümkün oluyor.
Genel olarak, hikâye kitabı gibi bir günde bitirilecek bir yapıt olmadı benim için. Araya başka okumalar aldım, kimi konular için başka kaynaklara da danışmam gerekti. Doğumun bütünüyle-dişiliği, kürtajın tamamı ile kadın kararı olması gibi kimi iddialarına katılmasam da, feminist literatüre yeni yeni giriş yapan bir okur olarak beklentimi karşıladı diyebilirim.
Cavarero'nun metnini rahat okumak için temel antik felsefe terimlerine, hâkim değilse de, aşina olmak gerekiyor. Genel hatlarıyla Platoncu felsefe ve idealar dünyası konseptleri ile ilgili fikir sahibi olmak da okuyanın işini kolaylaştıracaktır. Kitabın hedef kitlesi "konuya yabancı ortalama okuyucu" değil zannederim.
Temel olarak cinsel farkın Platoncu felsefede reddi, anne katli penceresinden, Platon metinlerinde satır aralarında kalmış kadın karakterlere alternatif okuma yaparken doğum, kürtaj hakkı, idealar dünyasının erkek/insanı üzerinde durulmuş. Özellikle son iki bölümdeki tespitleriyle, antik Yunan felsefesinin, sözgelimi, günümüz Türkiyesinde nasıl yansıdığını izlemek mümkün oluyor.
Genel olarak, hikâye kitabı gibi bir günde bitirilecek bir yapıt olmadı benim için. Araya başka okumalar aldım, kimi konular için başka kaynaklara da danışmam gerekti. Doğumun bütünüyle-dişiliği, kürtajın tamamı ile kadın kararı olması gibi kimi iddialarına katılmasam da, feminist literatüre yeni yeni giriş yapan bir okur olarak beklentimi karşıladı diyebilirim.
March 17, 2025
I can remember being blown away the first time I read this, and after revisiting, I am still blown away. The themes intersect with other feminist philosophers I’ve recently read, an indicator I think, that the voice of Irigaray (as scholarly mother?) echoes strongly with her philosophy of sexual difference. The Demeter chapter was my favourite. Within it, Cavarero offers a very considered and moving take on abortion rights for women. Life-changing. Her recuperation of meaning in birth (physis), the subjectivity of women in deciding to either give birth or not give birth, and her refiguring of the maternal literally as the mother-daughter pair (outside the patriarchal symbolic order) is something that hasn’t left my mind since reading
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