Plato on Art and Beauty


Book Description

This unique collection of essays focuses on various aspects of Plato's Philosophy of Art, not only in The Republic , but in the Phaedrus, Symposium, Laws and related dialogues. The range of issues addressed includes the contest between philosophy and poetry, the moral status of music, the love of beauty, censorship, motivated emotions.




Plato in L.A.


Book Description

No thinker in the West has had a wider and more sustained influence than the ancient Greek philosopher Plato. From philosophy to drama, religion to politics, it is difficult to find a current cultural or social phenomenon that is not in some aspect indebted to the famous philosopher and the Platonic tradition. It should come as no surprise that contemporary artists continue to engage with and respond to the ideas of Plato. Accompanying an exhibition at the Getty Villa, this book brings together eleven renowned artists working in a variety of media—Paul Chan, Rachel Harrison, Huang Yong Ping, Mike Kelley, Jeff Koons, Joseph Kosuth, Paul McCarthy, Whitney McVeigh, Raymond Pettibon, Adrian Piper, and Michelangelo Pistoletto—all of whom have acknowledged the role of Plato in their artistic process. Featuring candid interviews with the artists, this volume begins with an essay by the critic and curator Donatien Grau that contextualizes Plato in antiquity and in the present day. Contemporary art, Grau demonstrates, is Platonism stripped bare, and it allows us to reconsider Plato’s philosophy as a deeply human construct, one that remains highly relevant today.




Plato and Nietzsche


Book Description

It is commonly known that Nietzsche is one of Plato's primary philosophical antagonists, yet there is no full-length treatment in English of their ideas in dialogue and debate. Plato and Nietzsche is an advanced introduction to these two thinkers, with original insights and arguments interspersed throughout the text. Through a rigorous exploration of their ideas on art, metaphysics, ethics, and the nature of philosophy, and by explaining and analyzing each man's distinctive approach, Mark Anderson demonstrates the many and varied ways they play off against one another. This book provides the background necessary to understanding the principle matters at issue between these two philosophers and to developing an awareness that Nietzsche's engagement with Plato is deeper and more nuanced than it is often presented as being.




The Art of Living


Book Description

In this wide-ranging, brilliantly written account, Nehamas provides an incisive reevaluation of Socrates' place in the Western philosophical tradition and shows the importance of Socrates for Montaigne, Nietzsche, and Foucault.




Images of Excellence


Book Description

Plato was the first great figure in Western philosophy to assess the value of the arts; he famously argued in the Republic that traditionally accepted forms of poetry, drama, and music are unsound, claiming they are conducive to warped ethical standards, detrimental to the psyche, andpurveyors of illusions about important matters in human life. This view has been widely rejected; but Christopher Janaway here argues that Plato's hostile case is a more coherent and profound challenge to the arts than has sometimes been supposed.Denying that Plato advocates `good art' in any modern sense, Dr Janaway seeks both to understand Plato's critique in the context of his own philosophy and to locate him in today's philosophy of art, showing how issues in aesthetics arise from responses to his charges. Plato's questions about beauty,emotion, representation, ethical knowledge, artistic autonomy, and censorship are of contemporary relevance as formerly secure assumptions about the value of art and the aesthetic come under scrutiny.Images of Excellence gives a new and original view of a famous issue in the history of philosophy; it is written not only for readers working in ancient philosophy, but for all who are interested in aesthetics, art theory, and literary theory.




Plato and the Art of Philosophical Writing


Book Description

Plato's dialogues are usually understood as simple examples of philosophy in action. In this book Professor Rowe treats them rather as literary-philosophical artefacts, shaped by Plato's desire to persuade his readers to exchange their view of life and the universe for a different view which, from their present perspective, they will barely begin to comprehend. What emerges is a radically new Plato: a Socratic throughout, who even in the late dialogues is still essentially the Plato (and the Socrates) of the Apology and the so-called 'Socratic' dialogues. This book aims to understand Plato both as a philosopher and as a writer, on the assumption that neither of these aspects of the dialogues can be understood without the other. The argument of the book is closely based in Plato's text, but should be accessible to any serious reader of Plato, whether professional philosopher, classicist, or student.




Plato on the Value of Philosophy


Book Description

This book explores Plato's views on what an 'art of argument' should look like, investigating the relationship between psychology and rhetoric.




Plato's Theory of Art


Book Description

First published in 2000. This is Volume VII of ten in the International Library of Philosophy in a series on Ancient Philosophy. Written around 1953, this book looks at Plato and his ideas on art based on his ‘Dialogues’.




Plato at the Googleplex


Book Description

Acclaimed philosopher and novelist Rebecca Newberger Goldstein provides a dazzlingly original plunge into the drama of philosophy, revealing its hidden role in today's debates on religion, morality, politics, and science.




Aesthetics, Theory and Interpretation of the Literary Work


Book Description

This book introduces the reader to the literary work and to an understanding of its cultural background and its specific features. In doing so, it refers to two main traditions of Western culture: one of aesthetics and the theory of art and the other of literary theory. In our postmodern world, language and artistic creation (and above all literature as the art of language) occupy a special role in understanding the human world and become existential issues. A critical attitude requires knowledge of the relevant past in order to understand what we are today. The author presents key topics, ideas, and representatives of aesthetics, theory, and the interpretation of works of art in an historical perspective, in order to explain the Western tradition with constant attention to the present condition. Aesthetics, Theory and Interpretation of the Literary Work offers an outline of essential concepts and authors of aesthetics and theories of the literary work, presenting basic topics and ideas in their historical context and development, considering their relevance to the contemporary debate, and highlighting the specificity of the experience of the art work in our present world. The best way to approach a work of art is to enjoy it. In order to enjoy a literary work, we have to consider its correct context and its specific artistic qualities. The book is conceived as a general and enjoyable introduction to the experience of the work of art in Western culture. See inside the book.