Knut Ågotnes

Plato's philosophical dialogues can be seen as his creation of a new genre. Plato borrows from, as well as rejects, earlier and contemporary authors, and he is constantly in conversation with established genres, such as tragedy, comedy, lyric poetry, and rhetoric in a variety of ways. This intertextuality reinforces the relevance of material from other types of literary works, as well as a general knowledge of classical culture in Plato's time, and the political and moral environment that Plato addressed, when reading his dramatic dialogues. The authors of Philosophy as Drama show that any interpretation of these works must include the literary and narrative dimensions of each text, as much as serious the attention given to the progression of the argument in each piece. Each dialogue is read on its own merit, and critical comparisons of several dialogues explore the differences and likenesses between them on a dramatic as well as on a logical level. This collection of essays moves debates in Plato scholarship forward when it comes to understanding both particular aspects of Plato's dialogues and the approach itself. Containing 11 chapters of close readings of individual dialogues, with 2 chapters discussing specific themes running through them, such as music and sensuousness, pleasure, perception, and images, this book displays the range and diversity within Plato's corpus.

This paper is written on the supposition that the main theme in the Protagoras is the nature of Protagoras’ teaching. This teaching, as it must have been displayed in his lessons, is, however, neither accounted for nor discussed directly in the dialogue. Instead of asking Protagoras for a trial lecture, Socrates from the start is set to challenge the underlying assumptions of his teaching; the structure of its moral underpinnings. This structure, I assume, is less formed by theoretical thinking on Protagoras’ part than by social and institutional factors, factors that to a large extent determine the professional role of Protagoras as a teacher. I will discuss this structure under four headings: The expectations of a potential student. The ambiguities of Protagoras’ position as a teacher. Protagoras’ attitude to the virtues. What is it to live well?

Do we need histories of philosophy? If we do, what kind of histories? This article maintains that it is not possible to write a “scientific” or “neutral” history of philosophy. However, such histories could not fulfill the tasks that the history of philosophy should shoulder. The histories that we have, do fulfil these tasks. There is, however, ambivalence, and even obfuscation, in the way they do this. They are blurring the distinctions between philosophy and history of philosophy, and between history of philosophy and history of ideas. They are, however, intimately tied in to philosophy’s need to present itself as a basically unified discipline, and to -the attempts of this discipline to understand itself. When this self-understanding differs substantially, as between historicists and analytical philosophers, the opinons about the role the history of philosophy should play, also differ considerably. However, these differences are instructive. They tell us that the relations between philosphy and the history of philosophy should be a main area for reflections and discussions on the nature of philosophy.