Some Sketchy Notes on Phaedrus

One way to read Phaedrus is that it is three object lessons followed by analysis and then advice about how to construct a coherent body of thought.

First speech is like a first year student's essay, no intro, no conclusion, no transitions, no logoical order and asumed context (like a conversation among those co-present).

Second speech is carefully structured but not carefully thought out in that the concept of madness is given rather than dialectically interrogated.

Third speech is the most one might hope for. There's an introduction, definitions, division (where the issues is properly identified), transitions, summaries and forecasts, a conclusion, and even a peroration. It's fully developed and properly structured. It stuck to the original rules of the game, to promote the case of a would-be wooer, and one could argue even the non-lover's case since the philosopher isn't a lover in any commonsense sense. He is in love but doesn't want to seem so, which of course will help him make his case, since as we know being obvious isn't rhetorically effective, or at least it's not advised.

So the theme of love suggests that false rhetoric is about seducing and abandoning the audience, telling them what they want to hear in order to get your way without concern for what's best for them, or for you for that matter, especially if as the false rhetor you don't know what you are talking about. The true rhetor knows what's best for all concerned.

That's simple enough, I suppose, as far as it goes, but does the well-intentioned speaker really know what's best? Will dialectic produce "knowledge" sufficient to the task? Is the "love" as defined in the dialogue equal to the task? If the task was to instruct Phaedrus to seek the fulfillment of his true nature and to find a like-minded soul to help him find it, then perhaps "rhetoric" based on the practices of collection and division, as dialectic is defined in the dialog, should be able to accomplish this. At any rate it would seem Socrates can help, if his third speech is convincing proof that he knows best how to make speeches and making speeches is what Phaedrus's heart or soul desires.

But I am troubled by the idea that dialectic is a method of invention sufficient to producing the necessary "knowledge", which is not to say I think dialectic is useless; I think it is critical to effective invention. I'm just not so sure that rhetoric is supposed to be about "the truth" or even necessarily "the right" course of action. I'm not sure but that the speeches we make are designed to fill the void left by the absence of real knowledge--essentially a dramatized variation of an Aristotelian view. If we really knew, we wouldn't need to talk ourselves or others into it. hmm, that's not quite right. Maybe a war-like Greek would tell me that my nature is too passive for the fray, and so I would only seek the company of people who would be seeking me in the first place. And then again, does Socrates really love speeches and making them and critiquing them? Why did he have to seek the solitude of the plane tree to do what his soul inclines toward? Maybe he was just shining Phaedrus on, telling him what he wanted to hear so that he could get him alone and then bend his will in a different direction. By the time the drugs wear off, and the heat of the day passes, will Phaedrus still love dialectic? Will Socrates still care?

Here's something else to worry about. If the rhetor, for good or ill, has to know the types of soul and the types of speeches and the ways each soul is affected by each type of speech, then is there a risk that the rhetor will enchant herself? What if to be persuasive she has to be so focused on what the other needs to hear that she can no longer hear her own words or find herself? Can the speaker get lost in the audience? Would that be a bad thing?

This is where the rules of the game as they are set out at the beginning of Phaedrus impede progress, I think. By sticking to love Socrates restricts what he can say and even by re-defining it and bending it and shaping it, love is still essentially an emotion whispered in a single ear, even if in so doing it is inscribed on the one true soul. At best you get a long-term partnership, but love is a process that can't run a state or organize a city. Were one to go whispering in many ears (writing ideas down and casting them to the wind to fall on just anybody's ears), well that would lead to violence eventually and certainly it would corrupt the true rhetor. Which reminds me of Callicles' warning that Socrates must be careful not to be found whispering to boys among the shadows. If you need the crowd to hear, you can't whisper. Love isn't really up to the task of running the world. Or informing a rhetoric. Or so I'm thinking at the moment. I have been known to change my mind.

I realize I can be accused of taking a narrow view of love. There's Eros but there is also Agape, which is of course what Plato seems to be playing (Ludas) for. But even so, I'm not convinced that even Agape is enough when it comes to rhetoric. Do I have to love you to give you good advice in a way that will convince you to accept it? Do you have to love me to listen to me?

At any rate, taken as a pair, The Gorgias and The Phaedrus seem to offer an understanding of rhetoric that amounts to: know dialectic in order to discover the meaning of words and the relationships among them and thus what is good, and once you know what is good, then use rhetoric to capture an audience's assent.

Several things bother me about this rhetoric. One is the idea that you should think before you speak or by extension write. Writing and speech making can inform knowledge -- how can you know what you think until you see what you say? In fact, dialectical conversation is just such a form of invention. One can use writing in the same way to clarify ideas and establish connections and try out new ways of seeing the world. The other thing that bothers me about this understanding of rhetoric is its refusal of experience--the word translated as "knack" is "empiria" or experience. I think experience is relevant to learning and I do not believe that words contain the truth within them if only we can configure them properly. I'm not sure, either, that Plato is advocating that but it seems so to me this time around. That said, however, I do think dialectical practice is extremely valuable because it makes one a more supple thinker, attunes one's ear to the implications of statements, and makes one aware of assumptions that might otherwise go un-noticed.