Genres in Dialogue: Plato and the Construct of Philosophy

by Andrea Wilson Nightingale

In this very original study, the author investigates how Plato "invented" the discipline of philosophy. In order to define and legitimize philosophy, Dr. Nightingale maintains, Plato had to match it against genres of discourse that had authority and currency in democratic Athens. By incorporating traditional genres of poetry and rhetoric into his dialogues, Plato marks the boundaries of philosophy as a discursive and as a social practice.

Genres: Philosophy, Classical Studies

238 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1995

About the author

Andrea Wilson Nightingale is an American scholar working in the field of Classics. She is a Professor of Classics at Stanford University. She works on Ancient philosophy and literature, focusing on the intersection of philosophy and literature. She has also taught and written on ecological issues from a literary and philosophical point of view.

Reviews

[Erik Graff · Rating 4 out of 5]

Contrary to Aristotle's account in Metaphysics, philosophy originated with Plato, particularly with his portrayal of the archetypal philosopher, Socrates, within the pre-existing genre of the Sokratikoi logoi. His method of defining what is at once a discipline, a method and a life-style was substantially in terms of a critical distancing from and appropriation of other, established modes.
Spanning the fields of philosophy, literary theory, classics, sociology and history, Nightingale focusses on representative examples of "intertextuality" in the dialogues. Within the "supergenres" of poetry and rhetoric, she discusses tragedy, comedy, invective, parody, satire and such encomiastic forms as eulogy and epitaph, showing how Plato variously employed them, both adoptively and constrastively.
Now as then the status of philosophy is in question. Is it but another genre of discourse among others? Is it somehow superior to all others as their definer and arbiter? What did Plato himself believe?
Despite some conventional interpretations to the contrary, Nightingale represents Plato as a complex, even inconsistent, thinker, a man who changes his opinions and who entertains a host of possibilities; a man who would condemn poetry at one instant while employing it at another. Although sometimes appearing dictatorial, her Plato ultimately comes across as one who envisioned philosophy as more a form of life, a living process, than as a dogmatic science or delimited discipline. Plato is more like Socrates than like the Platonists of late antiquity or like his medieval readers. The task is more political and ethical than metaphysical.
Consequently, rather than forecasting philosophy's death through the thousand cuts of contemporary deconstruction, Nightingale suggests that its original spirit is indomitable. Philosophy is ever-recreational, its essential virtue a capacity to reconstruct itself in terms of prevailing "socio-political practices" and "intellectual developments."
This excellent work is not the definitive word on the matter, nor does it claim to be. As much prescriptive as descriptive, it is sufficient that its thesis be plausible. The entire Platonic corpus is not covered, nor are those works which are discussed treated with much attention to the problematic of their chronological order. Such a project has yet to be performed. Nightingale optimistically points the way.

[jt · Rating 4 out of 5]

Excellent investigation into Plato's use of existing rhetorical forms in order to critique and uproot the socio-political situation of classical Athens.

[Julia Novaes · Rating 5 out of 5]

good platonic scholarship can be So Sexy

[Jacques Bromberg · Rating 4 out of 5]

Nightingale's first book (1995) examines how Plato uses other ancient genres to introduce and define his practice of "philosophy".