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Philopoiêtai, Poetry Lovers from Time Immemorial

Philopoiêtai, Poetry Lovers from Time Immemorial “Plato’s Symposium shows how Plato deploys dramatic irony to undermine the philopoiêtai’s use of poetry. Elizabeth Belfiore (“Poets and the Symposium”) argues that the dialogue’s first five symposiasts, in their poetic...

Oracular, or Delphi at its Worst*

Oracular, or Delphi at its Worst* In Homer’s time no word existed for Art.  Praxitiles and Sappho had no term For it. The Greeks had not even the spore Of such a word, so Plato spoke no firm Ideals about that thing which we call art. He had too much, perhaps, to say...

Nietzsche vs. Plato

       Nietzsche vs. Plato Modern poetry  modern verse  contemporary poetry  contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem Nietzsche said that Plato was “the greatest enemy of art Europe has yet produced.” This Plato spoke in imagery so far Removed from Heidegger...

Mixed Race Divinity and Humanity

Mixed Race Divinity and Humanity Socrates “builds up a picture of the poet as ‘a light, winged, holy creature’, who cannot compose until he is out of his mind and possessed . . . .  The god takes away the poet’s senses, and uses him . . . so that the poems he utters...

Misogyny (μισογυνία) is a Greek Word

Misogyny (μισογυνία) is a Greek Word Modern poetry  modern verse  contemporary poetry  contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem “What would a man not give to engage in conversation with Orpheus?” ~ Plato That marble minded Plato thinks of men, Not women,...

Invisible Ivory Music

    Invisible Ivory Music   Heard melodies are sweet, but those unheard are sweeter. ~ John Keats Herus Pamphilius claimed that Orpheus’s drifting soul, destined to be incarnated anew in some other physical form after he had died, elected to be born a swan so that he...