This volume is a tribute to the thought of Seth Benardete by contributors who had the rare good fortune of studying with him or those who discovered the treasure of his writings. Benardete was fully immersed in the world of the ancients, starting with Homer, but their works opened up for him a way to the fundamental questions-about justice and love, nature and law, human and divine. Finding "the problem of the human good grounded in the city, and (...) the problem of being in god," he was led to the conclusion that "Political philosophy is the eccentric core of philosophy." While Benardete wrote this statement reflecting on the theological-political issue in the work of his teacher, Leo Strauss, the paradoxical notion of an "eccentric core," in giving this volume its title, is meant to capture a characteristic of his own way of thinking. The essays in this collection-on the Bible and Homer, the pre-Socratics, Plato, Aristotle, and the Roman writers-indicate the range of Benardete's studies and teaching. The centrality of Plato is evident at the same time in those pieces as well as in the reviews of Benardete's books included here, along with three of his own previously unpublished essays. Book jacket. (shrink)

The Archaeology of the Soul is a testimony to the extraordinary scope of Seth Benardete's thought. Some essays concern particular authors or texts; others range more broadly and are thematic. Some deal explicitly with philosophy; others deal with epic, lyric, and tragic poetry. Some of these authors are Greek, some Roman, and still others are contemporaries writing about antiquity. All of these essays, however, are informed by an underlying vision, which is a reflection of Benardete's life-long engagement with (...) one thinker in particular -Plato. The Platonic dialogue presented Benardete with the most vivid case of that periagoge, or turn-around, that he found to be the sign of all philosophic thinking and that is the signature as well of his own interpretations not only of Plato but also of other thinkers. The core of The Archaeology of the Soul consists of a set of essays Benardete produced in his last years; the collection provides at the same time an entry into that world through some of Benardete's earliest articles on Plato and on Greek poetry. Benardete's earlier path of close textual analysis always reflected his intimate philosophic dialogue with the thinker in whose work he was immersed; later, he drew on resources of erudition acquired over a lifetime to present a broader picture, on a theme like the dialectics of eros or freedom and necessity. In his late work Benardete was not only engaged in putting together in more general form material he had worked out earlier; he was still on the trail of new discoveries, above all, by extending his Platonic understanding of philosophy to pre- and post-Platonic thinkers. He had become increasingly aware that the discovery of philosophy through the "Socratic turn" was really the rediscovery of an understanding already present in some form in the Greek poets and that awareness guided his last years of study of the pre-Socratic philosophers. According to the standard view of the history of Greek philosophy, the Socratic turn, with its focus on "the human things," marks a point of radical change in philosophy's history. Benardete's late studies led him to the conclusion that the kind of pivotal reorientation thought to be Socratic is in fact the mark of what it means to think philosophically, and Heraclitus or Parmenides is a genuine philosophic thinker precisely to the extent that a Socratic turn can be found in some form within his own thought. At the same time that he was pursuing a track backward, from Plato to the poets and pre-Socratic philosophers, Benardete was also proceeding on a forward path, from Plato to the Latin writers, who adopt the Platonic way of thinking with full understanding of what it means to be "post-Platonic." As the essays collected in this volume demonstrate, the Platonic notion of a "second sailing" gave Benardete a key to the relation between Greek and Latin thought - and with that to a comprehensive under-standing of antiquity-as it did to the relation between poetry and philosophy as such. Ronna Burger teaches philosophy at Tulane University; she is the author of The Phaedo: A Platonic Labyrinth from St. Augustine's Press and Aristotle's Dialogue with Socrates: On the Nicomachean Ethics. Michael Davis teaches philosophy at Sarah Lawrence College; he authored Wonderlust: Ruminations on Liberal Education, The Poetry of Philosophy: On Aristotle's Poetics and, with Seth Benardete, translated Aristotle - On Poetics, both from St. Augustine's Press. Burger and Davis collaborated on editing Seth Benardete's Achilles and Hector: The Homeric Hero. (shrink)

In book IV of the Republic, Socrates offers an analysis of the tripartite structure of the soul as a perfect match-up to the class structure of the city. But the deeds that produce those speeches reveal the fixed relation among three independent parts to be the result of a dynamic process of self-division. This self-division is the work, more specifically, of thumos or spiritedness, which first cuts reason from desire, then separates itself from each in turn. By following this “plot,” (...) one uncovers the roots of the devotion to justice that animates the construction of the best city in speech. The psychology of Republic IV proves to be a striking model in miniature of what Seth Benardete called “the argument of the action.”. (shrink)

The Archaeology of the Soul is a testimony to the extraordinary scope of Seth Benardete's thought. Some essays concern particular authors or texts; others range more broadly and are thematic. Some deal explicitly with philosophy; others deal with epic, lyric, and tragic poetry. Some of these authors are Greek, some Roman, and still others are contemporaries writing about antiquity. All of these essays, however, are informed by an underlying vision, which is a reflection of Benardete's life-long engagement with (...) one thinker in particular -Plato. The Platonic dialogue presented Benardete with the most vivid case of that periagoge, or turn-around, that he found to be the sign of all philosophic thinking and that is the signature as well of his own interpretations not only of Plato but also of other thinkers. The core of The Archaeology of the Soul consists of a set of essays Benardete produced in his last years; the collection provides at the same time an entry into that world through some of Benardete's earliest articles on Plato and on Greek poetry. Benardete's earlier path of close textual analysis always reflected his intimate philosophic dialogue with the thinker in whose work he was immersed; later, he drew on resources of erudition acquired over a lifetime to present a broader picture, on a theme like the dialectics of eros or freedom and necessity. In his late work Benardete was not only engaged in putting together in more general form material he had worked out earlier; he was still on the trail of new discoveries, above all, by extending his Platonic understanding of philosophy to pre- and post-Platonic thinkers. He had become increasingly aware that the discovery of philosophy through the "Socratic turn" was really the rediscovery of an understanding already present in some form in the Greek poets and that awareness guided his last years of study of the pre-Socratic philosophers. According to the standard view of the history of Greek philosophy, the Socratic turn, with its focus on "the human things," marks a point of radical change in philosophy's history. Benardete's late studies led him to the conclusion that the kind of pivotal reorientation thought to be Socratic is in fact the mark of what it means to think philosophically, and Heraclitus or Parmenides is a genuine philosophic thinker precisely to the extent that a Socratic turn can be found in some form within his own thought. At the same time that he was pursuing a track backward, from Plato to the poets and pre-Socratic philosophers, Benardete was also proceeding on a forward path, from Plato to the Latin writers, who adopt the Platonic way of thinking with full understanding of what it means to be "post-Platonic." As the essays collected in this volume demonstrate, the Platonic notion of a "second sailing" gave Benardete a key to the relation between Greek and Latin thought - and with that to a comprehensive under-standing of antiquity-as it did to the relation between poetry and philosophy as such. Ronna Burger teaches philosophy at Tulane University; she is the author of The Phaedo: A Platonic Labyrinth from St. Augustine's Press and Aristotle's Dialogue with Socrates: On the Nicomachean Ethics. Michael Davis teaches philosophy at Sarah Lawrence College; he authored Wonderlust: Ruminations on Liberal Education, The Poetry of Philosophy: On Aristotle's Poetics and, with Seth Benardete, translated Aristotle - On Poetics, both from St. Augustine's Press. Burger and Davis collaborated on editing Seth Benardete's Achilles and Hector: The Homeric Hero. (shrink)

This collection of essays, presented in honor of Ronna Burger, addresses questions and themes that have animated her thinking, teaching, and writing over the years. With a view to the scope of her writings, these essays range broadly: from the Bible and Ancient Greek authors--including not only Plato and Aristotle, but also Sophocles, Euripides, Aristophanes, and Xenophon--to medieval thinkers, Maimonides, Dante, and Boccaccio, as well as modern philosophers, from Descartes and Montesquieu to Kant, Lessing, Hegel, and Kierkegaard. Moving (...) in order from antiquity to modernity, the essays highlight certain recurring philosophical issues, including the relations between nature and convention, law and justice, human and divine, in light of the indispensable need for questioning and self-knowledge. Taken collectively, the essays disclose intriguing connections among the various authors and texts and display how the themes of nature, law, and the sacred continue to resonate across time. (shrink)

Since antiquity the Phaedo has been considered the source of "the twin pillars of Platonism" -- the theory of ideas and the immortality of the soul. Burger's attempt to trace the underlying argument of the work as a whole leads to a radical rethinking of the status of those doctrines.

What is the good life for a human being? Aristotle’s exploration of this question in the _Nicomachean Ethics_ has established it as a founding work of Western philosophy, though its teachings have long puzzled readers and provoked spirited discussion. Adopting a radically new point of view, Ronna Burger deciphers some of the most perplexing conundrums of this influential treatise by approaching it as Aristotle’s dialogue with the Platonic Socrates. Tracing the argument of the _Ethics_ as it emerges through (...) that approach, Burger’s careful reading shows how Aristotle represents ethical virtue from the perspective of those devoted to it while standing back to examine its assumptions and implications. “This is the best book I have read on Aristotle’s _Nicomachean Ethics_. It is so well crafted that reading it is like reading the _Ethics_ itself, in that it provides an education in ethical matters that does justice to all sides of the issues.”—Mary P. Nichols, Baylor University. (shrink)

While Plato and Aristotle both recognize the importance of friendship and love, Aristotle seems to be as much the philosopher of philia as Plato is of eros. Aristotle’s extensive discussion of friendship in the Nicomachean Ethics includes only a few scattered remarks about eros. Following the thread of those remarks, however, uncovers a movement from the disparagement of eros, contrasted with friendship of the virtuous, to its elevation as the shared experience of philosophic friendship. In the quite different context of (...) Metaphysics Lambda, eros serves as the model for Aristotle’s famous account of the unmoved mover, where the activity of thought thinking itself provides, as an object of love, the ultimate source of motion in the universe. This paper explores what connection or common ground there may be between the presumably cosmological role of eros directed to the completed activity of mind and its place in Aristotle’s discussion of friendship. (shrink)

What is it about the nature of "soul" that makes it so difficult to adequately capture its complexity in a strictly discursive account? Why do some of the most profound human experiences elude our attempts to theorize them? How can a written document do justice to the dynamic activity of thinking, as opposed to merely presenting a collection of thoughts-as-artifacts? Finally, what can we learn about the activity of philosophizing, and about the human soul, by reflecting on the possibilities and (...) limitations of writing? These concerns, in various forms and in different registers, have preoccupied Michael Davis throughout his distinguished career. This volume is in honor of, and in dialogue with, Davis's work, which spans ancient philosophy and literature, continental philosophy and political philosophy. It includes original essays by numerous distinguished scholars in the fields of philosophy and political science. The remarkable range and caliber of the contributions attest to the breadth and depth of Davis's influence. The essays in Part I of the volume explore the nature of soul through the lens of tragedy. Part II consists of three essays that explore the human longing for perfect knowledge and completion--and the obstacles to the fulfilment of that longing--in relation to the divine. In Part III, the essays address the distinctive challenges of the political sphere and philosophy's relation to it. And while the relationship between philosophy and poetry is an implicit theme throughout the volume, the essays in Part IV focus directly on philosophy's aestheticizing tendencies. Many different philosophical and literary works are discussed throughout these chapters, including ancient works such as Plato's Republic, Euthydemus and Laws, Homer's Iliad, and Euripides' Trojan Women, as well as works by modern philosophers such as Rousseau, Kant, Hegel, Kierkegaard and Nietzsche. In addition, three essays analyze some of Shakespeare's plays in relation to the thought of Plato and Machiavelli. All of the essays are thematically linked by a common thread as they attend to the poetic dimension of philosophical thinking. Michael Davis is Professor of Philosophy at Sarah Lawrence College, where he has taught since 1977 and has been the Sarah Yates Exley Chair in Teaching Excellence (2003-2005). He has also taught on the graduate faculty at Fordham University and the New School for Social Research. He is the author of numerous articles and books, which include: Ancient Tragedy and the Origins of Modern Science; The Poetry of Philosophy: On Aristotle's Poetics; The Politics of Philosophy: A Commentary on Aristotle's Politics; The Autobiography of Philosophy; Rousseau's The Reveries of the Solitary Walker; Wonderlust: Ruminations on Liberal Education; and The Soul of the Greeks: An Inquiry. He is also co-translator (with Seth Benardete) of Aristotle's On Poetics. Contributors include: Abraham Anderson, Jonathan Badger, Robert Berman, Ronna Burger, Kenneth DeLuca, Gwenda-lin Grewal, Scott Hemmenway, Paul Kirkland, Mary Nichols, Denise Schaeffer, Paul Stern, Richard Velkley, Lisa Pace Vetter, Ann Ward, Lee Ward, Catherine Zuckert and Michael Zuckert. About the Editor: Denise Schaeffer is Professor of Political Science at the College of the Holy Cross. She is the author of Rousseau on Education, Freedom and Judgment and contributing co-editor (with Christopher Dustin) of Socratic Philosophy and Its Others. She is co-editor (with Gregory McBrayer and Mary P. Nichols) of the Focus Philosophical Library edition of Plato's Euthydemus, for which she authored the Introduction and co-authored the Interpretive Essay. (shrink)

BOOK Z OF THE METAPHYSICS is generally held to contain Aristotle's most comprehensive investigation of what we have come to call essence. One might reasonably be led back to that text, then, by the recent renewal of interest in essentialism, more particularly, by the debate about the merits of "Aristotelian essentialism." This is the label Quine employed in objecting to the doctrine--which he thought quantified modal logic was compelled to accept--that objects have, independent of our ways of specifying them, necessary (...) properties distinguishable from contingent ones; it is the label commonly applied to a thesis about general essence, referring to those properties which make an individual a member of a certain kind without individuating one such member from another. Whether a defense of "Aristotelian essentialism" is to be found in book Z of the Metaphysics, however, is far from obvious. The contemporary interest in defending essentialism, for one thing, is associated with a variety of related problems, including those of identity over time and across possible worlds, the status of natural kinds and of the laws of nature; and while Aristotle's discussion may not be irrelevant to these issues, they are not what is explicitly thematized in Book Z. The chief and primary and practically only concern "for us," Aristotle announces, is to theorize about being in its primary sense, what it is. It is not only in this concern that Aristotle may sound rather remote to contemporary ears, but, perhaps most conspicuously, in the odd formula he coins for what is traditionally translated "essence," namely, "the what-it-was-to-be." We are especially led to wonder just what notion Aristotle has in mind, and what role it plays, by the puzzling question he pursues through the central chapters of book Z: is each thing the same as its what-it-was-to-be? (shrink)

The Argument of the Action is a collection of essays by Seth Benardete on Greek poetry and philosophy selected and introduced by Ronna Burger and Michael Davis. We must be grateful to the editors for making these remarkable essays available to readers once again. The collection encompasses the greater part of the most significant authors of Greek antiquity: Homer and Hesiod, the tragedians, and Plato and Aristotle. Each essay opens up the work under consideration and illuminates its (...) essential concerns in such a new and yet convincing way that the reader is forced to experience simultaneously a shock of surprise and a sense of recognition. In interpreting these works, Benardete never repeats himself, never foists an alien schema upon the text, and never merely rests upon the laurels of an insight previously won. Yet, and this is one of the most admirable aspects of the book, despite the range of their topics and the individuality of each interpretation, the essays exhibit a rare unity of intellectual purpose. They constitute an exploration of a single terrain of reflection which includes, on the one hand, the character and meaning of Socrates’ “turn to the speeches” or his “second sailing” and, on the other, the setting and preconditions of that turn displayed in the works of the Greek poets. (shrink)

To his gratification, Jerome Eckstein admits, his previous book on Plato's Meno "was more warmly received by artists, novelists, and cooks" ; he has not abandoned that audience in this study of Plato's Phaedo, which is inspired, nevertheless, by a desire "to convince a few more professors." The Deathday of Socrates does not, however, in Platonic fashion, address a variety of readers on different levels through the same words; instead it is divided into parts, some of which are intended to (...) be of interest to "scholars" only. Of the three main parts, the first is a general introduction, the last a reprint of Jowett's translation of the dialogue. The central part is divided into sections consisting in a paraphrase of the relevant portion of the dialogue followed by interpretative comments; a third segment in some sections carries on a polemic with traditional interpretations--almost exclusively those of Hackforth and Bluck--in which the author, he warns us, "always emerges as the victor.". (shrink)

Ronna Burger’s Aristotle’s Dialogue with Socrates argues that the Nicomachean Ethics is a unified whole. Her reading runs against the tide of most contemporary scholarship. In particular, Book X.7–8, Aristotle’s valorization and near apotheosis of the “contemplative life,” has been taken to be a Platonic intrusion in a work otherwise characterized by a resolute “anthropocentrism,” as Nussbaum puts it. To account for such an apparent fracture commentators have attributed both chronological development and later editorship to the corpus. (...) class='Hi'>Burger, by contrast, offers a “Talmudic reading.” She treats the Nicomachean Ethics as a work of integrity that dialectically culminates in, rather than is interrupted by, X.7–8. This essay situates her argument in a larger context that explores the nature of philosophical reading as such. (shrink)

In order to understand the Gricean "logic of conversation" that underlies the Nicomachean Ethics, Burger believes it necessary to identify the audience to which the work is addressed: this is the audience of men and citizens who have received a good education, that is, have learned the virtues through habit, but have doubts about the content of the education received, that is, about the beautiful and the just. Aristotle proposes on the one hand to give them reasons to defend (...) and justify the moral virtues they have learned and they practice, but on the other hand also to lead them to understand a dimension that goes beyond the horizon of traditional ethos. (shrink)

Ronna Burger offers a reading of the Ethics that views the text as a dialogue with, and very much in the spirit of, the Platonic Socrates. In reading the text as a dialogue, Burger is not making a claim about Aristotle’s intentions. She is proposing “a tool of interpretation, to be judged by the philosophical result it yields, in particular, the underlying argument it discloses whose movement makes the work a whole”. Treating the text this way entails (...) focusing as much on the action, or, as she refers to it, the deed of the text, as on any alleged conclusions or doctrines. This deed turns out to be the very energeia of theoria concerning the best life for a human being that Aristotle, like Socrates, takes to be the activity conducive to living the happiest human life. Consequently, Burger is far more inclined to open issues up than she is to close them off.The dialogue with Socrates, Burger argues, has two distinct but related phases. Each phase begins by putting forward a view that differs from the Socratic view but which, upon examination, ends up motivating a position much like that of Socrates. The first phase begins with an understanding of ethics that separates the. (shrink)

Book reviewed in this article: The Philosophical Assessment of Theology: Essays in Honour of Frederick C. Copleston. Edited by Gerard J. Hughes. Language, Meaning and God: Essays in Honour of Herbert McCabe OP. Edited by Brian Davies. God Matters. By Herbert McCabe. Philosophies of History: A Critical Essay. By Rolf Gruner. The ‘Phaedo’: A Platonic Labyrinth. By Ronna Burger. Lessing's ‘Ugly Ditch’: A Study of Theology and History. By Gordon E. Michalson, Jr. Peirce. By Christopher Hookway. Frege: Tradition (...) and Influence. Edited by Crispin Wright. The Private World. Selections from the Diario Íntimo and Selected Letters 1890–1936. By Miguel de Unamuno, translated by Anthony Kerrigan, Allen Lacy, Martin Nozick. A Third Collection: Papers by Bernard J.F. Lonergan, S.J. Edited by Frederick E. Crowe. Philosophical Papers. By Charles Taylor. 2 vols. Principles of Language and the Mind. By T.P. Waldron. The Principle of Double Effect: A Critical Appraisal of its Traditional Understanding and its Modern Reinterpretation. By L.I. Ugorji. Human Rights: Fact or Fancy By Henry B. Veatch. Enlightenment and Alienation: An Essay towards a Trinitarian Theology. By Colin Gunton. Only Human. By Don Cupitt. The Roots of the Modern Christian Tradition. Edited by E. Rpzanne Elder. ‘Africanische Theologie’: Darstellung und Dialog.. By Heribert Rücker. African Religions in Western Conceptual Schemes. By Emefie Ikenga Metuh. The Destiny of Man: Dagaare Beliefs in Dialogue with Christian Eschatology. By Edward Kuukure. The World in Between: Christian Healing and the Struggle for Spiritual Survival. By E. Milingo. Theology in Africa. By Kwesi A. Dickson. The Future of Anglican Theology. Edited by M. Darrol Bryant. Reconciling. By John Coventry. The Genesis of Faith: The Depth Theology of Abraham Joshua Heschel. By John C. Merkle. Anthropology in Theological Perspective. By Wolfhart Pannenberg. Contemporary Approaches to the Study of Religion. Volume II: The Social Sciences. Edited by Frank Whaling. American Sociology: Worldly Rejections of Religion and Their Directions. By Arthur J. Vidich and Stanford M. Lyman. A Critical Theory of Religion: The Frankfurt School. By Rudolf J. Siebert. The Anthropology of Evil. Edited by David Parkin. The Wealth of Christians. By Redmond Mullin. Biblical Interpretation in Ancient Israel. By Michael Fishbane. Reading the Old Testament: An Introduction. By Lawrence Boadt. Old Testament Theology: Its History and Development. By John H. Hayes and Frederick C. Prussner. God's Conflict with the Dragon and the Sea: Echoes of a Canaanite Myth in the Old Testament. By John Day. Law and Wisdom from Ben Sira to Paul. By Eckhard J. Schnabel. The Order of the Synoptics: Why Three Synoptic Gospels? By Bernard Orchard and Harold Riley. The Making of Mark. By J. Duncan M. Derrett. Argumentation bei Paulus. By Folker Siegert. Christians and the Military: The Early Experience. Edited by Robert J. Daly. Origienes' Eucharistielehre im Streit der Konfessionen; Die Auslegungsgeschichte seit der Reformation. By Lothar Lies. L'église de Cappadoce au IVe siècle d'après la correspondance de Basile de Césarée. By Benpit Gain Cave Monasteries of Byzantine Cappadocia. By Lyn Rodley. Augustine of Hippo, Selected Writings. Translated with an Introduction by Mary T. Clark. Wisdom from St Augustine. By Vernon J. Bourke. A History of Religious Ideas, Vol. 3: From Muhammad to the Age of Reforms. By Mircea Eliade. Les Lectionnaires Copies Annuels: Basse‐Egypte. By Ugo Zanetti. Humanism and Scholasticism in Late Medieval Germany. By James H. Overfield. Wyclif. By Anthony Kenny. The Lady and the Virgin: Image, Attitude and Experience in Twelfth Century France. By Penny Shine Gold. Unquiet Souls: Fourteenth‐Century Saints and Their Religious Milieu. By Richard Kieckhefer. Luther: Theologian for Catholics and Protestants. Edited by George Yule. La Réforme Catholique: Le Combat de Maldonat. By Paul Schmitt. Roman Catholicism in England: From the Elizabethan Settlement to the Second Vatican Council. By Edward Norman. The Life of David Brainerd. Edited by Norman Pettit. Nineteenth Century Religious Thought in the West. Edited by Ninian Smart, John Clayton, Patrick Sherry and Steven T. Katz The Significance of Jesus Christ in Asia. By Hans Staffner. Is the Virgin Mary Appearing at Medjugorje? By René Laurentin and Ljudevit Rupčić. Mary Queen of Peace: Is the Mother of God Appearing in Medjugorje? By Lucy Rooney and Robert Fancy. (shrink)

This collected volume is inspired by the work of Edward Halper and is historically focused with contributions from leading scholars in Ancient and Medieval philosophy. Though its chapters cover a diverse range of topics in epistemology, ethics, and political philosophy, the collection is unified by the contributors’ consideration of these topics in terms of the fundamental questions of metaphysics. The first section of the volume, “Knowing and Being,” is dedicated to the connection between metaphysics and epistemology and includes chapters on (...) Heraclitus, Plato, Aristotle, and the Ancient Daoists. The second section, “Goodness as Knowing How to Be,” addresses ethics as an outgrowth of human metaphysical concerns and includes chapters on Plato, Aristotle, and Maimonides. Contributors include William H. F. Altman, Luc Brisson, Ronna Burger, Miriam Byrd, Owen Goldin, Lenn Goodman, Mitchell Miller, Richard Parry, Richard Patterson, Nastassja Pugliese, John Rist, May Sim, Roslyn Weiss, and Chad Wiener. (shrink)

Benardete here interprets and, for the first time, pairs two important Platonic dialogues, the Gorgias and the Phaedrus . In linking these dialogues, he places Socrates' notion of rhetoric in a new light and illuminates the way in which Plato gives morality and eros a place in the human soul.

_Theaetetus_, the _Sophist_, and the _Statesman_ are a trilogy of Platonic dialogues that show Socrates formulating his conception of philosophy as he prepares the defense for his trial. Originally published together as _The Being of the Beautiful_, these translations can be read separately or as a trilogy. Each includes an introduction, extensive notes, and comprehensive commentary that examines the trilogy's motifs and relationships. "Seth Benardete is one of the very few contemporary classicists who combine the highest philological competence with (...) a subtlety and taste that approximate that of the ancients. At the same time, he as set himself the entirely modern hermeneutical task of uncovering what the ancients preferred to keep veiled, of making explicit what they indicated, and hence...of showing the naked ugliness of artificial beauty."—Stanley Rose, _Graduate Faculty Philosophy Journal_ Seth Benardete was professor of classics at New York University. He was the author or translator of many books, most recently _The Argument of the Action, Plato's "Laws," and Plato's "Symposium,"_ all published by the University of Chicago Press. (shrink)