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Reviewed by:
  • Plato’s Four Muses: The Phaedrus and the Poetics of Philosophy by Andrea Capra
  • Charles Platter
Andrea Capra. Plato’s Four Muses: The Phaedrus and the Poetics of Philosophy. Hellenic Studies Series 67. Washington, D.C.: Center for Hellenic Studies. Distributed by Harvard University Press, 2014. Pp. xvii, 234. $24.95. ISBN 978-0-674-41722-9.

The title of this book requires some explanation. At Phaedrus 259c–d Socrates tells a story about the origin of cicadas. They were once men, he says, but died quickly because their total devotion to the Muses caused them to neglect both food and drink. From them the race of cicadas was born to sing and after death to report to each of the Muses how they were honored among men. Socrates mentions four Muses by name: Terpsichore and Erato, who are interested in dance and love, respectively, and Calliope and Urania, who are the Muses of philosophy. This catalogue, with its four named Muses, provides the title for Capra’s book on the Phaedrus. In it he argues for the thematic significance of these Muses here and within the Platonic corpus as a whole. According to Capra, in Phaedrus Plato describes a style of philosophical discourse that has a [End Page 430] special connection to the Muses and “turns out to be . . . a form of provocatively old-fashioned mousikê” (xiii).

The idea that there is an important connection between the Platonic dialogues and the Greek poetic tradition will surprise no one. Despite the reservations about poetry expressed in the Republic and elsewhere, Plato’s work shows a sustained interest in poetry. Moreover, the dialogues themselves are creations of art with many of the same characteristics we associate with poetry. Yet Capra takes this argument in a whole new direction with a number of provocative statements. He argues that the first part of Phaedrus is a reenactment of the performance of the Stesichorus poem of Helen.1 Capra goes on to say that the Helen-themed compositions of Gorgias, Isocrates, and Sappho are reflected in the structure of the dialogue as well; that references in the dialogue to the plane tree are meant to evoke the arboreal cult of Helen (59); that the cicada scene mentioned above is Plato’s reworking of myths of poetic initiation, such as we see for Hesiod at Th. 22–34 and for Archilochus on the Mnesiepes inscription (E1 II Clay); and that the prayer to Pan (279b–c) connects the initiation of poets to the cult of Socrates at the Academy, providing an “aition for the foundation of Plato’s Academy” (xiv). None of these statements strikes me as intuitively obvious. This is not to say that Capra could not be correct, of course, but the sheer complexity of the formulations would require a particularly lucid presentation in order to persuade. Unfortunately, the argument often does not supply this sort of analysis. As a result, I often failed to see connections where Capra did.

The lack of clarity extends to other aspects of the book as well. The preface begins with a puzzling metadiscourse about the book’s imagined audience. This audience is said to include the general reader and students of the reception of Greek lyric poetry. Its primary audience, however, consists of “Platonists,” whom Capra characterizes as either “gods” or “giants,” appropriating a metaphor of Plato’s Eleatic Stranger (Sophist 246a–b) to distinguish idealist from materialist thinkers. The discussion that follows the introduction of the metaphor is difficult to follow. The “Platonists” appear to be two types of professional philosophers, although later both types seem to be contrasted with philologists. The more general criticism that Capra seems to make is that Platonic studies are excessively compartmentalized and ought to make use of a multidisciplinary approach. I do not disagree. However, the vagueness of the controlling metaphor makes it difficult to be certain (this probably labels me as a giant).

This is a book with many interesting ideas. Others may find them argued more persuasively than I did. It is certainly not a book for the general reader (pace Capra) or for undergraduates. Nevertheless, graduate students and scholars in classics and philosophy may...

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