Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to ask about the relation of language to the possibility of community and to do so in the context of Heidegger and Gadamer's reflections on the privileged status of poetic speech for any understanding of language. In his most extensive treatment of the notion of the polis, Plato takes up this question of the relation of poetic speech to the city. He comes to the conclusion that such forms of speaking are risky and problematic for any possibility of community. Though the "exile" of poets in the Republic is to be read ironically, it nonetheless gives voice to a serious concern that philosophers have a tendency to share about the relation of speech to the community, namely, that such philosophic speech, conceptual speech, best serves the needs of political life. I argue, against this view, that we find something essential for reflections on the polis in thinking through the character of poetic speech. I do this with reference to the a number of texts by both Gadamer and Heidegger. In the end, I argue for a sort of reversal of the Platonic exile of poetic speech from the polis, suggesting that such speech needs to be taken up at the origins of any polis