Each of Shakespeare's plays "also functions in context with all the other" plays (and the poems).
The texts (particularly Hamlet) were revised and added to over years.
"To even begin to understand [Shakespeare] one must take the point of view of a *participant* [at least as groundling], not of a passive reader and still less that of a partisan critic."
(That said, I do recall a college friend who took notes on the dialogues solely by compiling a list of all the possible ways of agreeing with Socrates....) --CGE
On Apr 16, 2012, at 9:05 AM, Shane Mage wrote:
> On Apr 15, 2012, at 11:48 PM, 123hop at comcast.net wrote:
>>
>> A good deal of what Plato reports Socrates says....
>
> The point is that Plato was never (except perhaps in the Apology)
> "reporting" in any sense of that word.
> He was writing philosophical dialogues in which "Sokrates" is one
> dramatic character among others.
> The meaning of any statement by any persona in a dramatic dialogue
> is to be found exclusively in the context of that dialogue.
> The relevant difference between Plato and Shakespeare is that
> Shakespeare's plays are works in themselves while each of Plato's
> dialogues also functions in context with all the other dialogues.
> To even begin to understand Plato one must take the point of view of
> a *participant* in the dialogue, not of a passive reader and still
> less that of a partisan critic.
>
> " sounds like Socrates is passing along some kind of eastern-type
> philosophy, which Plato can't quite understand.
>> That's all I'm saying. No way to prove it. "
>
> I should think not, since Sokrates notoriously never lived anywhere
> but Athens and the original, and very recent, texts of the Buddha's
> teachings (the only "eastern-type" philosophy then existent) were
> yet unknown anywhere outside the subcontinent. Also, gnostic ideas
> are Christian. not eastern.
>>
>>
>>> It's a hypothesis. My take away from reading the dialogs.
>>>
>>> We know nothing about Socrates except what Plato tells us.
>>>
>> See the contradiction? your "take away" is based on writings of
>> someone who doesn't grasp ideas that you know only from his writings?
>> Would you say that Shakespeare doesn't grasp Hamlet's ideas?
>>
>>> On Apr 15, 2012, at 3:18 PM, 123hop at comcast.net wrote:
>>>>
>>>> Plato...was incapable of really comprehending Socrates's gnostic
>>>> teachings...
>>>
>>> What were those gnostic teachings? Where can they be found?
>>
>> Shane Mage
>>
>> This cosmos did none of gods or men make, but it
>> always was and is and shall be: an everlasting fire,
>> kindling in measures and going out in measures."
>>
>> Herakleitos of Ephesos
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
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