Description

Plato's dialogues stand at a transition from orality to literacy. They are living contradictions--partly oral and partly literary. This relationship between orality and writing is one of the most vexed issues in the history of Platonic interpretation and has particular relevance for the progressive erosion of literacy in favour of digitalisation today. This book argues that the relationship between the oral and the written in Plato's dialogues is not a straightforward opposition, but is instead grounded in ontological analysis and exemplified by the ontology of the image, which appears throughout the Platonic canon.

"This book makes a contribution to the topic, with some remarkable scholarly insights, and it may be useful for an introductory reading (in translation) of some key texts in the Platonic corpus, especially for those who are interested in the reception of the problem of mimesis in authors of the philosophical production of the 20th century."
-Tomás N. Castro, University of Lisbon, Bryn Mawr Classical Review 2024