Abstract

As one would expect, Benardete's commentary, too, is much more concerned with the literary dimension of the dialogue than are its predecessors; so much so in fact that they cannot really be compared. The difference is almost as fundamental as that between a world constituted by visual experiences and one constituted by aural ones. Benardete evinces no interest in some of the issues which most exercise other commentators, such as whether the theory of forms has undergone any revisions. On the other hand he offers many provocative insights of a kind that more argument-focused commentators neglect; for example, that the tension between the fixed limits of the Philebus and the fact that the Philebus is only a segment of a conversation that began before the part recorded, and has not yet ended when the record stops, is an image of the tension portrayed within the dialogue between the limit and the unlimited. This is not merely a nice point about Plato's use of imagery, but it implies that we must read the dialogue as a whole in a different way than we read a self-contained argument. On more specific issues as well, Benardete asks questions and provides insight into matters that do not interest more analytic commentators.