Notice Board

The Philosophy Department Colloquium Series presents the followiing:

Plutarch: "That a Philosopher Ought to Converse especially with Men in Power", Moralia 776b-779c
Guest Speaker:  Craig Cooper (Dean, A & S)
Day/Time:  Monday, February 6, 2017
Time:  2:00 p.m.
Location:  TH204 (Turcotte Hall, U of L)

Abstract: Plutarch begins this little essay by comparing the philosopher, who converses with a man in a position of power, to an erastes courting an eromenos: “To embrace Sorcanus to your bosom, and to prize, purse, welcome and cultivate philia, … is characteristic of those who love beauty, are politically minded (politikon) and generous, and not, as some believe, characteristic of those who love a reputation” (776b). The opening statement (776b), which sets the tone for the whole essay, is tinged with homoerotic language. The context, where the encounter between the philosopher and the man of power takes place and their philia is given expression, is the symposium. In the essay there are varying degrees of intertextuality at play.  In some cases we are looking at quotations or allusions from other genres, like epic, philosophy, tragedy and comedy, that are interwoven into the text, the kind quotations or allusions, which one would expect to find in clever rhetorical display pieces delivered by participants at a symposium.  But the intertextuality goes deeper almost to the point of intergenericity.  To demonstrate this I will trace the sympotic imagery that is woven through the essay, to see whether there is any generic influence from Plato’s or Xenophon’s Symposium (are the two kinds of logoi talked about by Plutarch meant to recall the two kinds of eroi?), and second to examine some of language and metaphors used in this essay that we find repeated elsewhere in the Moralia and the Lives in order to understand more fully what Plutarch means here when he calls his philosopher politikos.