Scaling the Ladder. Why the Final Step of the Lover’s Ascent is a Generalizing Step
The ‘Scala Amoris’ (210a-212b), or ‘Ladder of Love’, constitutes the philosophical and aesthetic centrepiece of Socrates’ encomium of Eros in Plato’s Symposium. Here Diotima describes how a lover ascending up the Ladder directs his erotic attention to a number of difference kinds of beautiful object...
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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Coimbra University Press
2015-12-01
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| Series: | Plato |
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| Online Access: | https://impactum-journals.uc.pt/platojournal/article/view/2164 |
| Summary: | The ‘Scala Amoris’ (210a-212b), or ‘Ladder of Love’, constitutes the philosophical and aesthetic centrepiece of Socrates’ encomium of Eros in Plato’s Symposium. Here Diotima describes how a lover ascending up the Ladder directs his erotic attention to a number of difference kinds of beautiful objects, first bodies, then souls, just institutions and knowledge, until he catches a glimpse of Beauty itself. In this paper I advance an ‘inclusive’ reading of the lover’s ascent – to use Price’s 1991 terminology – with a particular emphasis on justifying such a reading concerning the final step.
http://dx.doi.org/10.14195/2183-4105_15_6 |
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| ISSN: | 2079-7567 2183-4105 |