Attending to the interlocutors with which the Republic is engaged, we will strive to better understand and evaluate its own poetics and arguments. We will also read Sophocles’ Antigone and Aristophanes’ Clouds and the lyric poetry of Sappho to trace the equally important dialogues that the Republic opens with tragedy, comedy and lyric poetry.

We next devote 5 sessions to reading Homer’s Iliad which is a constant point of reference in the Republic. In the first week we read Plato’s Apology of Socrates as an introduction to the figure of Socrates. In this course, we will be particularly attentive to the dialogic character of Plato’s writing in its exchanges with other authors, genres and modes of thought. Moreover, as an exemplar of open and critical inquiry, both in Plato’s time and beyond, the figure of Socrates is a vital resource for our own engagements with the contemporary world.

In its aspiration and scope, the Republic offers an illuminating starting point for the endeavour of liberal education. And while it may be said to contain a social contract theory, a theory of psychology, a theology, a critique of mimetic art, a theory of education, and a typology of political regimes, it is reducible to none of these. Rather than a series of separate treatises, the Republic addresses its themes as the subject of a dynamic and open investigation that transcends disciplinary boundaries as we have come to conceive them. Through its depiction of Socrates in conversation, it draws us into a dialogue about ethical, political, aesthetic, and epistemic questions that are fundamental to human life. The Republic offers a unique point of entry into the epochal philosophical, political, and literary achievements of fifth and fourth-century Athens. Bard College Berlin's core curriculum begins with a semester-long engagement with Plato’s Republic in dialogue with the main works and movements that shaped its cultural and intellectual context.

Walking with Ramona by Laura O. Foster