Plato's Progeny How Plato and Socrates Still Captivate the Modern Mind

Socrates wrote nothing; but Plato's accounts of his life and thought were pivotal in the development of Western politics, ethics, and metaphysics and both continue to play crucial and dramatically changing roles in Western culture. The triumph of democracy in the last 200 years, for instance, has led many to side with the Athenians against a Socrates whom they were right to kill. This book is framed by accounts of modern responses to the trials of Socrates and the ironies of his inquiry. At its center are two chapters exploring the idea of Platonic 'œorigins'� in philosophy and of Platonic 'œfoundations'� for philosophical politics, as these have been interpreted by Coleridge, Nietzsche, Heidegger, Popper, and Murdoch among others. The author argues that the search for Platonic origins is an artifact of postmodern liberalism.

Melissa Lane is University Lecturer in History at Cambridge, specialising in political thought, and a Fellow of King's College, Cambridge.