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The Symposium is a dialogue that was written by Plato around 370 BCE
. In it, a man tells a story he heard from another man about a symposium (which translates to “drinks party”) at which Socrates, Aristophanes, and other eminent Athenians were invited to make speeches in praise of the god of Love. Plato’s further retelling of this repeated tale puts us among the famous and famously loquacious partygoers who try to verbally outdo each other.It is useful to keep in mind that the word philosopher literally means “lover of wisdom.” In The Symposium, Plato presents the love of wisdom as the highest form of love and philosophy as a refinement of our sexual urges that leads us to desire wisdom over sex.
Read the free full text of the work, the overall summary, and the overall analysis of The Symposium. Or, learn more by studying SparkNotes guides to other works by Plato.
