“The Symposium” in “The Dialogues of Plato” brings back memories of a couple of fraternity parties I attended many years ago, an invitation as it were, to a very active drinking party, but this one is where a group of Athenian intellectuals are exchanging their views on eros, or desire. From their conversation a series of thoughts are offered on gender roles, sex in society, and the diversion of the energy of basic human instincts. The Symposium is a sharing of different viewpoints and ideas about the nature of love as a response to beauty, a cosmic force, a motive for social action, and as a means of ethical education
Aristophanes’ speech zones in on what he perceives as human nature and a mythical account of how Love shows itself among human …show more content…
Perhaps in taking his myth seriously, he does not so much want us to take it literally as he wants us to take the comic view seriously. That is, we should not laugh off his myth as nonsense, but rather ask what we can learn from it. Like all good comedy, Aristophanes' myth is not entertainment purely for the sake of entertainment. In producing an uplifting response in his listeners, it appears that Aristophanes hoped to lead them to a certain view point on love.
Apart from the repeating themes of myth and folklore, in his speech Aristophanes also repeatedly uses examples of the changes in the size and shape of human beings, changes in the genitals' positions, changes when split in half, and the origins of sexual orientation.
Aristophanes describes the feeling of the inability to describe what makes humans beings feel whole when they are with their other halves. He sees the finding of the person who is our other half is an end in itself.
When we do find our other half, we are overwhelmed with affection, concern, and love for that person. This great amount of care cannot result simply from a desire for sex, but we have difficulty expressing precisely what it is that makes us care so much. Love is the name that we give to our desire for wholeness, and the need to be restored to our original
Aristophanes’ speech zones in on what he perceives as human nature and a mythical account of how Love shows itself among human …show more content…
Perhaps in taking his myth seriously, he does not so much want us to take it literally as he wants us to take the comic view seriously. That is, we should not laugh off his myth as nonsense, but rather ask what we can learn from it. Like all good comedy, Aristophanes' myth is not entertainment purely for the sake of entertainment. In producing an uplifting response in his listeners, it appears that Aristophanes hoped to lead them to a certain view point on love.
Apart from the repeating themes of myth and folklore, in his speech Aristophanes also repeatedly uses examples of the changes in the size and shape of human beings, changes in the genitals' positions, changes when split in half, and the origins of sexual orientation.
Aristophanes describes the feeling of the inability to describe what makes humans beings feel whole when they are with their other halves. He sees the finding of the person who is our other half is an end in itself.
When we do find our other half, we are overwhelmed with affection, concern, and love for that person. This great amount of care cannot result simply from a desire for sex, but we have difficulty expressing precisely what it is that makes us care so much. Love is the name that we give to our desire for wholeness, and the need to be restored to our original