Sócrates enamorado: Cómo se hace un filósofo

by Armand D’Angour, Amelia Pérez de Villar (Translator)

La imagen más común que se tiene de Sócrates es la de un pensador extraordinario y original que siempre fue pobre, viejo y feo. Lo poco que se sabe de él comienza cuando era un hombre de mediana edad y termina con su juicio y condena a muerte. Pero ¿cómo fueron los primeros años de su vida? ¿Qué impulsó al joven Sócrates a convertirse en filósofo? ¿Qué imagen podemos extraer de su trayectoria personal más allá de los retratos que de él hicieron Platón o Jenofonte? ¿Y en quién se inspiró el filósofo ateniense para configurar su doctrina del amor?

En esta sorprendente biografía, que narra desde la infancia de Sócrates hasta su juventud y madurez, Armand d’Angour da respuesta a preguntas que parecían irresolubles, pero que pueden resultar fascinantes para quienes creen que ya saben todo sobre este filósofo excepcional. A partir de referencias menos conocidas pero igualmente autorizadas, y con una extraordinaria dosis narrativa que dota de cuerpo a los indicios que ofrecen las principales fuentes que conocemos, el autor nos muestra una nueva imagen de Sócrates, que se centra en el viaje iniciático del filósofo y acaba por revelar la identidad de la mujer que más influyó en su pensamiento.

Genres: Philosophy, Biography, History, Nonfiction, Classics, Audiobook, Greece

220 pages, Paperback

Published January 16, 2020

Reviews

[Dante · Rating 3 out of 5]

Given that the central thesis of D'Angour's book-that the transformative dialogue Socrates reveals himself to have had with Diotima as a younger man, as recounted in the Symposium, was in fact a discourse with Aspasia, but one veiled in Plato's writing for a multitude of reasons - forms only a small part of his argumentation but much of the framing, its difficult to know what precisely to review.

Much of the book's documentation of Socrates's life is of a broader kind; D'Angour paints a striking image of the cultural-politics of Pericles' Golden Age, offers rather detailed account of its military culture and Socrates's place within it, and initiates a very worthwhile exploration of both his relationship with the doomed Alcibiades and his troubled (specifically, traumatic, in D'Angour's empathetic reading) with his stone-mason father, Sophroniscus. The bulk of work is thus a highly readable dive into the overlapping social, intellectual and geopolitical contexts of Socrates' life, and D'Angour is particularly clear in his recasting of the persona of Socrates against a more standard account. Centring the precisely voluntary nature of his later-life spent as the gadfly of the Agora, given his inherited wealth and potential status as a landlord, and combatting those repulsive characterisations which culminated with Nietzsche's tirade against Socrates as a 'typical criminal' in his Twilight of the Idols('monstrum in fronte, monstrum in animo'), D'Angour reconstructs a far richer version of Socrates, in which his military heroism is more coherently related to his life bound by inquiry and continual wrestling with the Delphic Oracle.

I certainly don't have the resources to contest his conclusions tout court(and very little scholarly apparatus is offered in the book to track D'Angour's shaping of the evidence) and while he is very honest about the fairly speculative nature of the claims he's making, this doesn't prevent them from remaining unconvincing, even if appealing. Not unconvincing out of down-right implausibility but rather on grounds that this new image of Socrates relies on accepting the ever-growing network of claims that D'Angour makes about his character. As summarised neatly in the epilogue, D'Angour's portrait of Socrates relies on tying together a rather blunt potential medicalisation of Socrates' behaviours and experiences with a fractured relationship with his Father, and then a host of other peripheral conjectures relating to his interactions with Aspasia

He might have explored further a few other aveneus which he just gestured toward; for example, I eagerly await a longer commentary on how Aspasia might arrive into philosophical cannon, as it seems a certainly worthwhile venture. Ultimately, a somewhat rushed narrative closes the book, when I was hoping for a more considerable exploration of his character and thought as they appear throughout the Socratic dialogues, or a substantial weighing up of Aristole and Plato's variants of his personality and philosophical pursuit, when the former never met Socrates but nonetheless poses a distinct characterisation of him. Certainly a book worth reading and enjoying, and the promised shift in understanding of Socrates is half-fulfilled, but I'm unsure about whether D'Angour quite hits his own targets.

[Cassandra · Rating 3 out of 5]

Intriguing premise, but the sources are just too fragmented for me to see this as anything but speculation. I'm glad I read it but I prefer The Hemlock Cup by Betthany Hughes for an interpretation of Socrates.

[Chloe · Rating 3 out of 5]

yeah its fine
good for further a level research tbh

[Amir · Rating 4 out of 5]

عنوان کتاب یه کم به زردی می‌زنه. ولی این‌جور نیست. کتاب خوبیه برای شناخت سقراط و تصویر تازه‌ای ازین فیلسوف به دست می‌ده.

[Olga Vannucci · Rating 5 out of 5]

Socrates' life,
Pericles' wife.

[Maher Razouk · Rating 5 out of 5]

الحب
.
.
في الأصل ، كما يقول أريستوفانيس ، كان الكائن البشري عبارة عن مركب من ذكر وأنثى . كانت الكائنات البشرية مستديرة الشكل ، مخلوقات ممتلئة الجسم بأربعة أذرع وأربعة أرجل ، ووجهان ينظران في اتجاهين متعاكسين ، وأربع آذان ، ومجموعتين من الأعضاء التناسلية ، وما إلى ذلك.

جعلتهم قوتهم البارزة طموحين بشكل مفرط ، لذلك حاولوا بالفعل الصعود إلى الجنة لمهاجمة الآلهة.

تناقش زيوس والآلهة الأخرى حول ما يجب القيام به. لم يرغبوا في إبادة البشر لأن ذلك سيعني نهاية كل التكريم والتضحيات التي قد يحصلون عليها. لذلك توصل زيوس إلى خطة لإضعاف هذه المخلوقات عن طريق تقسيم كل منها إلى قسمين: قام بتقطيعها من المنتصف ، كما لو كان يقطع بيضة مسلوقة إلى نصفين بسلك. عندما تم قطع المخلوق الأصلي إلى قسمين ، اشتاق كل نصف إلى النصف الآخر ، وحاولوا يائسين دمج أنفسهم مرة أخرى ببعضهم البعض ، ولكن دون جدوى. وهكذا يستمر الأمر ، كما يقول أريستوفانيس. كل واحد منا هو مجرد نصف إنسان ، ونحن في مسعى أبدي للعثور على النصف المطابق. الحب هو القوة التي تجعلنا نحاول استعادة طبيعتنا الأصلية ونصبح كاملين مرة أخرى.
.
Armand D’Angour
Socrates in Love
Translated by #Maher_Razouk

[nicole luk · Rating 4 out of 5]

how did people act and think like this in 400 BC and how did we go backwards

[Mehmet · Rating 3 out of 5]

A book of ancient gossips, it shows how much imagination and guesswork is required in the attempt to paint a true picture of the original philosopher. I am not convinced by the "love" argument. Still, an interesting read built around the masterful use of a great bibliography.

[Bagja Hidayat · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book changes my mind about Socrates. I know about him from Plato and Xenophon works: old philosopher who big belly, bald, and ask everything to all people in the street and market. D’Angour brings Socrates as a warm person with full of love, the guy with muscle because he was a warrior, and so on. His true love not Xanthippe, his wife, but Alcibiades, the boy who gave him Platonic’s love. From Diotima, Socrates learnt about how love not only sexual desire but the basic of concept of philosophy.

[Tyrell · Rating 3 out of 5]

The author proposes a novel, but highly speculative, thesis.

[Andre Noel · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a fascinating book that reviews a wide spectrum of evidence to provide context to Socrate's life. It is well written.

[Eric · Rating 4 out of 5]

Long ago, in a culture different than most cultures, in a city known as Athens, philosophy began. One of the most important aspects of consciousness attendant to an improved understanding of consciousness and communication was provided by Socrates. Socrates never wrote anything down, did he? His intentions were not clarified since he rarely talked about why he gathered groups of people together to communicate for a period of time concerning a subject, did he? Perhaps he did not know why he did what he did? I propose that his reason was not apparent to him or anyone else. He mentioned a voice he had within him. That voice is the one I am attempting to introduce since it likely was Earth Based Source Consciousness (EBSC). He was likely attempting to derive an understanding of truth. Recall that Athens, like most societies was dominated by males. There was intimacy amongst the males of the population. Since most of the world is the second ray of consciousness, the ray of resistance, intimacy can bring agreement more effectively than any other factor. That was likely why philosophy began in "Greece." Intimacy allows for an improved environment for agreement, doesn't it? An important factor in finding a common understanding in any situation is intimacy, isn’t it? Common understandings can be facilitated by an understanding of a subject being discussed in that moment, can’t they? Not writing anything down was likely a preferred context for truth by Socrates.

How is it that human beings have grown to find relevance to any cultural understanding? That is a much larger context, isn’t it? If truth is found only in intimacy, if reality is best shared in intimacy, what is happening in the world attempting to communicate remotely? Truth is no longer possible in a world based in remote communication, is it? Therefore, the problem referenced as polarization results mostly from the Internet and remote communication, doesn’t it? Some of the important factors associated with communication missing in remote communication are both body language as well as tone of voice. Aquarian Theosophy is developing an understanding of consciousness to clarify another aspect of communication, love. EBSC, facilitating our intimate communication and love, can be introduced to assist in understanding both love as well as communication. I'm writing a book about human consciousness entitled Endless Love, the Story of Humankind in Consciousness.

[Rebecca Fung · Rating 5 out of 5]

I think this has to be read in the light that we don't have a lot of reliable sources about Socrates' life, and the author is upfront about this. This is a different approach to Socrates - it's about Socrates the man rather than Socrates the ideas.

I liked this approach as the bits we do know about Socrates or have been said about him cast him as an interesting character. I read this as a story, not a reference book, and found it highly enjoyable. I think if you look at it from the perspective of "Socrates' life could have been a movie" this works well. You would expect a movie to make some assumptions to fill in the blanks.

I liked this different approach to Socrates because it makes us think about how we view historical figures, how we've come to view them and how this shapes our philosophy. As it was pointed out, there are some different possibilities for various parts of Socrates' lives and these may have been carefully differently reported by those who wanted to write and rewrite him in different ways. It's interesting to reflect on how this may affect many of our views of historical figures, even those of whom we have better records.

[Siem Lowis]

Sometimes we stop doing something for specific reasons.
Then we forget about those reasons, and go back to doing whatever we stopped doing...
Only to learn again why we stopped doing something - and go back to not doing it.

In my case the thing I stopped doing a while ago was reading modern accounts of ancient Greek figures.
The reason was the following: Modern accounts often make ancient events/figures fit modern clothes. Modern accounts desire to turn Sappho into a feminist icon, Plato into an atheist icon. Perhaps they aren't even entirely wrong, yet it gets rid of an ancient figure's/event's entirety/complexity - the buffet of interesting details which make things so lovely.

The modern depiction seems, at times, closer to fan fiction than anything else. Which, sure, is fine as long as we admit that that's what we're doing - or desire to read (modern retellings of ancient Greek tragedy and mythology can be fantastic and have real potential).

I kind of forgot those reasons as to why I tended to avoid modern accounts. Now I remember.


No stars in this review as I feel that it would be unfair to the author and the book. I'm sure many could easily enjoy this book.

[Eric Rietveld · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wildly speculative, but, when dealing with biased, fragmented sources, what else can be expected? Socrates is perhaps one of the most enigmatic personalities of our known history, if only because we both know so much about him, but also nothing about him—a paradox I think he would find highly entertaining. This attempt to recreate the person behind the Socrates of Plato and Xenophon was well thought out and an entertaining read. As the author alludes in the afterword—I’m ready for the movie.

[Harriet · Rating 3 out of 5]

An interesting read which taught me quite a bit, but it all felt a bit jumbled. The conclusion seems clear early on but the majority of the book feels like background rather than anything evidential. I realise that this is ancient history, and we have to make a lot of suggestions and assumptions rather than telling factual stories, but I didn’t feel convinced about anything by the end. However, there were some intriguing ideas in there, and it was written in a very readable way.

[Matthew · Rating 3 out of 5]

A good overall biography of Socrates with some interesting and well-researched theories regarding the lesser known aspects of his life. Overall a very good biography, although some of the conjecture about Socrates' health conditions (such as him having catalepsy) and the supposed romantic links between him and Aspasia seem tenuous. However, the core of D'Angour's assertions remain solid and believable, which makes this a highly informative read.

[António · Rating 4 out of 5]

Com espírito inquiridor de detective, inteligência para construir deduções e inferências, e solidez argumentativa que baste para sustentar as suas especulações, D'Angour oferece uma proposta de biografia de um Sócrates que em vários pontos (física e emocionalmente) se afasta da imagem tradicionalmente oferecida por historiadores e filósofos. Tudo apoiado num conhecimento admiravelmente extenso do tema, e numa escrita simples, escorreita e agradável de seguir.

[Florence · Rating 4 out of 5]

Half the sentences started with "we may imagine" or "it is likely", the proof that Diotima was actually Aspasia is based on Dan-Brown style exegesis of the Symposium, there is very little time spent on Socrates' thought and pages dedicated to proving Socrates was actually hot - but it was undeniably entertaining.

[Jayaprakash Satyamurthy · Rating 3 out of 5]

A decent introduction to Athens around the Periclean age, and to Socrates, but D'Angour's thesis about Socrates and Aspasia is highly speculative, and his exposition of it is the least compelling part of the book. Perhaps this should have been a novel?

[Samuel Weiss · Rating 3 out of 5]

An appealing tale, though relies heavily off speculation. D'Angour has a tendency to write down everything he knows about Athenian history. Would be improved with more focussed writing and better editing.

[Kabindra · Rating 3 out of 5]

The author is clear about the reliability of the things stated, it's all just the interpretation and on the aspect of interpretation the author have done a great job. However, the author being a professor, this books is much more like a research paper or a thesis written by a historian.

[Pete · Rating 4 out of 5]

A great read. It took me back in time and led me on a journey through the (mostly imagined but well researched) life of an important person. It would make a great movie - but not in the Hollywood blockbuster style.

[Zoe · Rating 2 out of 5]

“in a dialogue not written by socrates he refers to a woman as honored by zeus. this must be the lifelong mistress of pericles and socrates must have had an affair with this women as a young man because wouldn’t that be interesting?”

I refuse to take you seriously

[Marcus Goncalves · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting read on the life of Socrates. Perfect for those who have not studied Classics as it does not assume pre-existing knowledge but erudite and entertaining as well. It can be dragging at times, monotonous.

[Benji]

Biopic in the making.

[Jack Robinson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great book that led me down a summer rabbit hole, starting with Thucydides' Pelopennesian War.

[Kate McMahon · Rating 3 out of 5]

a good book to familiarize yourself with socrates

[Jim Woolwine · Rating 3 out of 5]

Substantial conjecture. If you read this book start with the Afterword. The author condenses the narrative in a coherent way - then tackle the detail and repetitive text.

[Christian Ritter · Rating 4 out of 5]

Makes some bold claims, but an enjoyable (if semi-fictive) and gripping account.