PhilosophyBook · -385
Symposium
Plato
Six Athenians take turns defining eros over wine, Aristophanes explains that humans were once spherical and got split in half, and then a spectacularly drunk Alcibiades arrives to talk about Socrates instead. Funnier than its reputation suggests.
Why you should read this
This dialogue is the source of the idea now called platonic love and remains a standard entry point for the philosophy of desire and beauty. Structured as a sequence of after-dinner speeches, it is more approachable and literary than most of Plato's other dialogues.
- Field
- Philosophy
- Form
- Non-fiction
- Published
- 385 BCE
- Themes
- Philosophy, Ancient GreecePhilosophy
