Abstract

Available from UMI in association with The British Library. Requires signed TDF. ;The thesis is a study of the interaction in the early and middle Platonic dialogues between argument and literary presentation. The basic contention is that these aspects of the dialogues are complementary, and that neither will be fully understood if studied in isolation from the other. Literary form, in particular, is not purely ornamental, but contributes to the expression of Plato's thought both by illustrating the arguments and by supplementing and modifying interpretation of them. ;This contention is illustrated and supported by studies of particular dialogues and the significance for their arguments of certain stylistic and structural features. Successive chapters discuss the significance of dramatic or narrated form; the relations between interlocutors; Socrates' reeferences to the supposed sources for his views; and aspects of the form taken by the argument in the Protagoras and Gorgias. Within its main argument for the significance of literary form, the thesis thus contains arguments concerning the interpretation of particular works. ;The thesis concludes with a discussion of Plato's conception of understanding and its communication, which is seen as underlying his use of a form of writing in which interaction between argument and presentation is so significant. The dialogues demand from the reader a greater effort in interpretation than a straightforward exposition of doctrine; this is appropriate to Plato's views as to what is required for the communication of understanding. Discernment of the interaction between form and content is an element in the critical work required of the reader. The discussion of this question is at the same time a further illustration of the relation between argument and presentation; it is in part an exploration of what can be learned concerning Plato's conception of understanding from the interaction of form and content, in particular in the Meno and Phaedrus