A01=Grace M. Ledbetter
Against the Sophists
Ambiguity
Author_Grace M. Ledbetter
Category=DSA
Category=DSBB
Category=DSC
Counterexample
Criticism
Crito
Demodocus (Odyssey character)
Didacticism
Dogma
Epic poetry
eq_bestseller
eq_biography-true-stories
eq_isMigrated=1
eq_isMigrated=2
eq_nobargain
eq_non-fiction
Euthyphro (prophet)
Explanation
Fiction
Fifth-century Athens
G. (novel)
Generosity
Genre
Hermeneutics
Hesiod
Hippias
Homer
Homeric scholarship
Iliad
Inference
Irony
Knowledge
Literary criticism
Literary fiction
Literary theory
Mimesis
Moral authority
Morality
Muse
Narrative
Notion (ancient city)
Odysseus
Phemius
Philosopher
Philosophy
Philosophy and literature
Pindar
Plato
Poet
Poetics
Poetics (Aristotle)
Poetry
Principle of charity
Prodicus
Protagoras
Relativism
Rhapsode
Rhetoric
Satire
Skepticism
Socrate
Socratic
Socratic method
Sophist
Storytelling
Suggestion
Superiority (short story)
Swarthmore College
The Death of the Author
Theogony
Theory
Theory of Forms
Thought
Trojan War
Verisimilitude
Verisimilitude (fiction)
Xenophanes
Product details
- ISBN 9780691096094
- Weight: 340g
- Dimensions: 152 x 235mm
- Publication Date: 10 Nov 2002
- Publisher: Princeton University Press
- Publication City/Country: US
- Product Form: Hardback
Secure
checkout
Fast Shipping
Easy returns
Combining literary and philosophical analysis, this study defends an utterly innovative reading of the early history of poetics. It is the first to argue that there is a distinctively Socratic view of poetry and the first to connect the Socratic view of poetry with earlier literary tradition. Literary theory is usually said to begin with Plato's famous critique of poetry in the Republic. Grace Ledbetter challenges this entrenched assumption by arguing that Plato's earlier dialogues Ion, Protagoras, and Apology introduce a distinctively Socratic theory of poetry that responds polemically to traditional poets as rival theorists. Ledbetter tracks the sources of this Socratic response by introducing separate readings of the poetics implicit in the poetry of Homer, Hesiod, and Pindar. Examining these poets' theories from a new angle that uncovers their literary, rhetorical, and political aims, she demonstrates their decisive influence on Socratic thinking about poetry. The Socratic poetics Ledbetter elucidates focuses not on censorship, but on the interpretation of poetry as a source of moral wisdom.
This philosophical approach to interpreting poetry stands at odds with the poets' own theories--and with the Sophists' treatment of poetry. Unlike the Republic's focus on exposing and banishing poetry's irrational and unavoidably corrupting influence, Socrates' theory includes poetry as subject matter for philosophical inquiry within an examined life. Reaching back into what has too long been considered literary theory's prehistory, Ledbetter advances arguments that will redefine how classicists, philosophers, and literary theorists think about Plato's poetics.
Grace M. Ledbetter is Associate Professor of Classics and Philosophy at Swarthmore College.
