OpenGrad

Unit 2: Plato II — Republic and the Critique of Poetry

Duration

Weeks 5-8

Central Questions

  • What is justice, and why should one be just?
  • What is the ideal political order, and what does it reveal about the soul?
  • What is the nature of knowledge, and how does it differ from belief?
  • Why does Plato banish the poets from the ideal city?

Overview

The Republic is Plato's most ambitious and influential work—a dialogue that moves from a simple question ("What is justice?") to a comprehensive vision of metaphysics, epistemology, psychology, politics, and education.

The dialogue's central move is the analogy between city and soul: to understand justice in the individual, Socrates proposes examining justice "writ large" in the ideal city. This leads to the construction of the kallipolis—the beautiful city—with its controversial features: philosopher-kings, the allegory of the cave, the abolition of private property and family for the guardians, and the expulsion of the poets.

We read the Republic not to accept its political program but to understand the problems it addresses and the philosophical architecture it constructs. The theory of forms reaches its fullest expression here; so does Plato's account of knowledge; so does his psychology of the tripartite soul.

Readings

This unit covers Republic Books I-X. It's a substantial text (~300 pages). Pace yourself.

Week 5: Justice and the Challenge (Books I-II)

Book I (~30 pages)

  • Cephalus: justice as honesty and paying debts
  • Polemarchus: justice as helping friends and harming enemies
  • Thrasymachus: justice as the advantage of the stronger
  • Socrates' refutation of Thrasymachus (or is it?)

Book II (~25 pages)

  • Glaucon and Adeimantus renew the challenge
  • The ring of Gyges
  • The demand: prove that justice benefits the just person, in itself, apart from consequences
  • The proposal to examine justice in the city first

Reading time: ~5-6 hours

Writing assignment (due end of Week 5):

500 words on Glaucon's challenge (358e-360d):

Glaucon distinguishes three types of goods: (1) goods we value for their own sake, (2) goods we value for their consequences, (3) goods we value for both. Where does justice belong? Why does Glaucon demand that Socrates show justice is good "in itself"? Is this a reasonable demand?

Week 6: The City and the Soul (Books III-V)

Book III (~25 pages)

  • Education of the guardians
  • Censorship of poetry and music
  • The "noble lie"

Book IV (~30 pages)

  • The completed city
  • The four virtues in the city
  • The tripartite soul: reason, spirit, appetite
  • Justice as each part doing its own work

Book V (~35 pages)

  • Equality of women guardians
  • Abolition of private family
  • Philosopher-kings: "unless philosophers rule..."

Reading time: ~7-8 hours

Writing assignment (due end of Week 6):

500 words on the tripartite soul (435a-441c):

Explain Plato's argument for dividing the soul into three parts. What is the principle of opposition he uses? Give an example of inner conflict that this model explains. Can you think of cases of inner conflict it doesn't explain well?

Week 7: Knowledge and the Forms (Books VI-VII)

Book VI (~30 pages)

  • The philosopher's nature
  • Why philosophers are useless or corrupted
  • The form of the Good
  • The sun analogy
  • The divided line

Book VII (~30 pages)

  • The allegory of the cave
  • Education as turning the soul
  • The curriculum: mathematics to dialectic
  • The return to the cave

These are the most famous and most philosophically dense sections of the dialogue. Read slowly.

Reading time: ~6-7 hours

Writing assignment (due end of Week 7):

500 words on the divided line (509d-511e):

Reconstruct the divided line. What are the four segments, and what kind of cognition corresponds to each? How does the line relate to the cave allegory? What is the relationship between the visible and intelligible realms?

Week 8: Poetry, Mimesis, and Conclusion (Books VIII-X)

Book VIII (~25 pages)

  • The decline of regimes: timocracy, oligarchy, democracy, tyranny
  • The corresponding soul-types

Book IX (~25 pages)

  • The tyrannical soul
  • Three arguments that justice is profitable
  • The allegory of the allegory

Book X (~30 pages)

  • The critique of mimesis (imitation)
  • Poetry banished from the city
  • The myth of Er

Reading time: ~6-7 hours

Unit Essay (due end of Week 8):

2,500 words.

Prompt: Why does Plato banish the poets from the ideal city? Reconstruct his arguments against poetry in Books III and X. What conception of art (mimesis) underlies this critique? Is Plato right that poetry is dangerous? Consider: Plato himself writes in a poetic form (dialogue, myth, imagery). How do you resolve this apparent tension?

Key Concepts to Master

  • Justice (dikaiosyne): Each part (of city or soul) doing its proper work
  • Tripartite soul: Reason (logistikon), spirit (thymoeides), appetite (epithymetikon)
  • Philosopher-king: Those who know the forms, especially the form of the Good, should rule
  • The form of the Good: The highest form; source of being and intelligibility for all other forms
  • The divided line: Four levels of cognition corresponding to four levels of reality
  • The cave: Allegory for the human condition and philosophical enlightenment
  • Mimesis: Imitation; the mode of poetry and art
  • Allegory of the allegory: The cave is itself an image (eikon)—what does this suggest about the dialogue's method?

Connections Forward

  • Aristotle's critique of the forms and of Plato's politics (Units 3-4)
  • The concept of ideology (Marx, Frankfurt School) echoes the cave
  • The critique of instrumental reason (Adorno) has roots in Plato's ambivalence about techne
  • Heidegger's reading of Plato's "doctrine of truth"
  • The quarrel between philosophy and poetry continues through continental aesthetics

Notes on Reading

The Republic rewards re-reading. You won't catch everything the first time. Mark passages to return to.

Pay attention to the dramatic elements: who is speaking, where the conversation takes place, how Socrates handles different interlocutors. The form of the dialogue is itself philosophical.

Do not consult secondary literature. After completing your own reading, discussion is welcome.