Love, Rhetoric, and Truth

One thing is for sure: classical texts are far more beautiful and figurative than most contemporary theory that I read. But of course, Plato, Socrates, and Isocrates were all dealing with some very abstract subjects that lend themselves to this kind of writing.

I’m particularly thinking of the third speech that Socrates gives in the Phaedrus, where he is speaking about how love reinvigorates the wings that we once had in the heavens, produces in us a feeling that makes us want to rise back up to the perfect world – as well as his comments on insanity and sanity; that those who are insane are often prophets, that can see through to the perfect forms of reality, and thus incite others to follow them and earn the honorable sorts of things that the “nonlover” would do for the “lover,” ultimately claiming that the lover is better because he comes closer to the truth, but has difficulties getting this truth across through speech and writing, so he is considered “mad.”

While I don’t entirely get the connection between Love in this writing and Rhetoric, I do like the ending of the writing where we get into more literal terms: the function of writing, the function of speech, etc.

I love how Socrates says, “Since the function of speech is to lead souls by persuasion, he who is to be a rhetorician must know the various forms of the soul” (163). We might be able to equate “souls” with “minds” as I believe nous is the Greek term for either.

Near the end of the writing again, he recaps what he thinks about speech with, 

“A man must know the truth about all the particular things of which he speaks or writes, and must be able to define everything separately; then when he has defined them, he must know how to divide them by classes until further division is impossible; and in the same way he must understand that nature of the soul, must find out the class of speech adapted to each nature, and must arrange and adorn his discourse accordingly, offering to the complex soul elaborate and harmonious discourses, and simple talks to this simple soul. Until he has attained to all this, he will not be able to speak by the method of art, either for purposes of instruction or of persuasion” (167).

The “method” of persuasion becomes very clearly tied to what we know of Truth – whether or not Truth can ultimately be transmitted through communication or if one has to come to those modes of truth by themselves. It’s also interesting that Socrates and Plato (or rather, Plato makes Socrates say) that they believe writing harms the sense of memory. This is a big deal even for today – when it comes to using computers for data storage, calculators to solve equations, even our phones to save phone numbers and addresses. Socrates also tells the story about the Egyptian God who believed that letters “will make the Egyptians wiser and will improve their memories; for it is an elixir of memory and wisdom that I have discovered,” but the other replies, “you, who are the father of letters, have been led by your affection to ascribe to them a power the opposite of that which they really possess. For this invention will produce forgetfulness in the minds of those who use it, because they will not practice their memory” (165). I love the mythological proportions that writing earns in these classical texts. 

I think that whole debate on writing, however, just goes to show the different methodologies that were in practice at the time, and it reflects the different values of different sorts of teachers who wanted to do different things with their teachings.