This volume derives from a habilitation completed by the author in 2018. In it, Professor Goeken undertakes to fill two important lacunae in classical scholarship, an analysis of the theme of rhetoric in the Platonic and Xenophontic Symposia and a comparison of the two compositions from this (and other) perspectives. It is extraordinary that little sustained attention has been given to either of these two important subjects. Goeken has read and assimilated an enormous bibliography covering almost everything written on the two Symposia. He offers his learning in clearly written, lucidly argued, well-structured chapters. In the avant-propos, he offers essential background to the study of Greek rhetoric and symposia and sets out his general approach. The first half of the book (23-186) treats the Platonic Symposium, and the second half (188-388) the Xenophontic one.
The book takes the form of a discursive commentary proceeding sequentially from the beginning to the end of the compositions. This enables the author to avoid the temptation of cherry-picking and it makes it easy to find his discussions of any given passage. Goeken uses the term ‘rhetoric’ in a broad sense as the art of words, and sometimes in a more precise sense as the art of persuasion, which he connects, rightly enough, with the activities of people known as sophists, although not only with them.
Plato’s Symposium
Goeken makes an excellent case for the proposition that Plato was deeply concerned with rhetoric and was consciously addressing it in Symposium. As he notes, Plato shows his interest in rhetoric, his mastery of the genre, and his desire to revolutionize its practice in works such as Apology, Menexenus, Gorgias, and Phaedrus (24-25).[1] All the speeches in Symposium are forms of enkomia, and hence rhetorical demonstrations. Each speech is distinguished from the others not only in contents but also in its formal features. Plato’s creative contribution to the art of the enkomion is particularly evident in the speeches of Aristophanes, Agathon, Socrates, and Alcibiades.
In addition to displaying his ability in the composition of rhetorically sophisticated speeches, Plato also offers a few terse but significant reflections on rhetoric as commonly practiced. Pausanias critiques the principles used by Phaedrus; Eryximachus critiques and expands on Pausanias; Eryximachus suspects, and Aristophanes confirms, that Aristophanes will make a different kind of enkomion; Agathon criticizes his predecessors for failing to speak about the nature of eros, a criticism that Socrates fully endorses. Most important is the statement by Socrates that the speaker should select from the true things that can be said those that are most beautiful and arrange them most fittingly (198d2-7; see pp. 108-113).[2] This announces Plato’s vision of a truthful and philosophically responsible form of rhetoric.
Just as in Apology Socrates claims to be ignorant of the methods of judicial rhetoric, so too in Symposium he claims to be ignorant of the methods of encomiastic rhetoric, and in both cases proposes to speak in his own truthful manner. He compares the effect of Gorgian rhetoric to that of the head of a Gorgon and rejects the previous speeches for aiming at something other than truth. While rhetoric makes one silent as a stone (198c), a different kind of silence accompanies the philosophical contemplation of beauty.
But despite Plato’s serious reservations about rhetoric, he acknowledges that rhetoric can play a role in a philosophical quest, albeit not as vital a one as dialectic. Speeches of praise are not adequate means of evaluating what is good or bad about any practice or how to go about doing it. But they can contribute to a philosophical quest, as Socrates shows both by incorporating elements of the earlier speeches and by making his own speech a fine rhetorical display of makrologia, using Diotima as his excuse.
Goeken’s comments on the meeting between Socrates and Aristodemus are worthy of special mention. In his reading, the reference to the Doloneia in this passage suggests that Socrates is inviting Aristodemus to join him in a night-time attack on the party of rhetorically sophisticated symposiasts meeting at Agathon’s house just as Odysseus and Diomedes joined forces to attack the Trojans (p. 48). This imagery does not of course alter the evident erotic motive that is primary for Socrates.
I find little to criticize in this account of rhetoric in Plato other than to say that there is room to pay more attention to the role of self-presentation in the encomiastic speech (Goeken mentions the theme briefly on p. 102).[3] This dimension of the speeches implies, in effect, that they are also acts, and this might somewhat alter the conclusions that Goeken reaches in the second part of the book.
Xenophon’s Symposium
The second part of the book concerns Xenophon’s Symposium. Here, as Goeken notes, there is less concern with rhetoric, but that is precisely the point. As he shows, Xenophon’s Symposium is animated by the principle that actions speak louder than words, which is in itself a criticism of rhetoric. The alternative to speech in Xenophon’s view is not abstract truth, but rather everything that is included in the concept of erga.
The introductory chapter of this section is particularly insightful. In addition to introducing the reader to the Symposium, Goeken offers an excellent account of the role of rhetoric and praise in Xenophon’s thinking generally (196-208), on the role of speech and silence in other symposiastic scenes (214-216), and especially on the theme of words and actions (221-236). Here he offers a ground-breaking analysis of the contrast between Plato’s and Xenophon’s approach to rhetoric in the Symposia, arguing that while Plato promotes a truth-based rhetoric and points the way beyond rhetoric to dialectic and to wordless contemplation, Xenophon opposes speech to deed. This extends from the opening reference to the compositions as portraying the acts of gentlemen (tōn kalōn k’agathōn erga) to the silent gazing at young Autolycus, the performances of the acrobats and musicians, the famous beauty contest, where Socrates pointedly moves the lamp close to Critobulus, and on to the (nearly) silent performance of an erotic skit at the evening’s end. In between, as Goeken shows, Xenophon places considerable emphasis on the role of vision in all kinds of less obvious ways. Although some of the examples the author offers are questionable, insofar as they involve a metaphorical use of the language of vision, his point that Xenophon provides a spectacular portrait of a symposium as a corrective and response to Plato’s overly verbal portrait remains fundamentally sound and important. As he notes, this is not merely an emphasis on spectacle as a form of entertainment, but also on action as a manifestation of aretē.
Particularly interesting is Goeken’s analysis of the brief invitation-scene in Xenophon’s Symposium (276-288). One might think that 12 pages is too much space for a discussion of these three sentences, but Goeken uses the space to elucidate all the nuances of this passage, bringing out its profound significance. The immediate challenge is to explain why Socrates is insulted by Callias’ well-intentioned compliments. Callias’ preference for the purified souls of Socrates and his friends over political and military figures seems an admirable sentiment, and the fact that in praising Socrates he denigrates his own lavish preparations for the evening seems like a mark of some kind of modesty or humility on his part, or even of a philosophic sentiment. On the other hand, by praising the Socratic group for decorating his house, he treats them as useful objects. Even the compliment is insulting, because, unlike Plato’s Socrates, Xenophon’s Socrates sees political achievement as the highest achievement of all, and Socrates may sense that this is how Callias intends it after all.[4] At the very least, Socrates treats Callias’ compliment as if it were an insult. As Goeken notes, the exchange concerns the very subject on which Apollodorus berates his listeners in Plato’s Symposium, and with a similar tone. To my mind, Goeken’s analysis reveals the similarity between this scene and the superficially generous welcome given by Cephalus to Socrates in Plato’s Republic, a work that certainly influenced Xenophon’s Symposium.
As he notes, this exchange highlights the opposition between sophia, which Callias had famously sought to acquire by paying Sophists, and the philosophia which Socrates and his companions have earned by their own efforts (autourgous). Here again the opposition between erga and speech comes to light. But the focus is less on criticizing the Sophists, whose wisdom Xenophon rarely questions, but rather those who think they can gain that wisdom by means of pay. The passage thus connects with Socrates’ comment later, recalling his words in Plato’s Protagoras, that the guests, not the paid performers, should provide the entertainment (3.2). In contrast to Callias, who has made no personal effort to acquire wisdom, Socrates and his companions are presented as tough workers in a field akin to agriculture. The author compares Socrates’ superficially humble mocking response to Callias with the no less transparent false humility of Plato’s Socrates in regard to Agathon.
It is especially worthwhile to read Goeken’s analysis of Callias’ response to Socrates’ words, which in a way summarizes the main themes of the composition:
καὶ πρόσθεν μέν γε, ἔφη, ἀπεκρυπτόμην ὑμᾶς ἔχων πολλὰ καὶ σοφὰ
λέγειν, νῦν δέ, ἐὰν παρ᾽ ἐμοὶ ἦτε, ἐπιδείξω ὑμῖν ἐμαυτὸν πάνυ πολλῆς
σπουδῆς ἄξιον ὄντα (1.6)
In short, this book is an excellent resource for the study of these two subtly interrelated dialogues. It breaks new ground, while referring sensitively and critically to the conclusions of previous scholarship. I find it remarkable that I was able to agree with nearly everything the author wrote, and I felt I was cheering him on as he delved into the implications of one scene after another. For anyone who wishes a reliable introduction to the two Symposia, one that dwells more on the literary and rhetorical aspects than on the philosophical arguments, this is a great resource.
Notes
[1] I would add that the ring of Gyges is an image of the power of rhetoric to make crime invisible, which makes it the reverse of the Platonic aim of making virtue philosophically visible.
[2] This is a valuable key to understanding Greek enkomia in general, especially within the Socratic orbit. It suggests that when an enkomion offers only mild praise this does not necessarily reflect a desire by the author to damn the object of praise, but merely the desire to avoid falsehood.
[3] This is not an anachronistic notion, to judge by Aristotle’s use of the term prospoiēsis, and by his emphasis on the role of ethos in rhetorical speeches.
[4] He cites Pierre Pontier ‘Socrates dans la maison de Callias: du bon usage de l’ambition’. Etudes Platoniciennes 6, 2009, 125-139. See also Mem. 1.6.15, where Socrates rejects the insinuation that he is not a political actor.