Self-Knowledge in Plato's Phaedrus (Literatures)
Determined to take every part of the dialogue seriously as a single deliberate philosophical design, Griswold analyzes each episode in turn, with subtlety and much sensitivity. . . . This is a book well worth reading, and a commendable effort. --Martha Nussbaum, Times Literary SupplementThe chief virtue of the book as a whole is that it goes to the heart of many of the central issues, both about the Phaedrus and about its author. The argument it contains is a potent mix: alternately provoking, illuminating, and infuriating. It is to be warmly recommended to anyone with a serious-or even playful-interest in Plato. --Christopher J. Rowe, Washington Book ReviewGriswold has a refreshing approach to the traditional interpretive problems of this dialogue. He does not simply seek out a connection between its two apparently disconnected halves, but finds philosophic purpose in the very sharpness of the transition between them; and he argues, against the prevailing view, that not only the rhetorical and mythical speeches on love in the first half of the dialogue but even the formal methodologies of Collection and Division and of a philosophic rhetoric in the second are presented in such a way that their limitations show. --G.R.F. Ferrari, Philosophical ReviewThe chief virtue of the book as a whole is that it goes to the heart of many of the central issues, both about the Phaedrus and about its author. The argument it contains is a potent mix: alternately provoking, illuminating, and infuriating. It is to be warmly recommended to anyone with a serious-or even playful-interest in Plato. --Christopher J. Rowe, Washington Book ReviewGriswold has a refreshing approach to the traditional interpretive problems of this dialogue. He does not simply seek out a connection between its two apparently disconnected halves, but finds philosophic purpose in the very sharpness of the transition between them; and he argues, against the prevailing view, that not only the rhetorical and mythical speeches on love in the first half of the dialogue but even the formal methodologies of Collection and Division and of a philosophic rhetoric in the second are presented in such a way that their limitations show. --G.R.F. Ferrari, Philosophical Review