| Phi 220 Spring 2016 |
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This selection comes from a point fairly early in the Republic when Socrates is beginning to describe his ideal city and is discussing the eduction of the rulers and their auxiliary “guardians.” The selections we will discuss concern one part of their education, “music” (the other part is “gymanstic”).
• Much of the discussion (pp. 8-23) actually concerns literature (the performance of Homeric epic poetry was accompanied by a sort of lyre and sung or intoned, so this key part of Greek literature provided the lyrics for musical performance, and Greek tragedy developed out of, and retained traces of, choral song). Of this discussion, the part in book II (pp. 8-14) concerns the accuracy of contents of literature while that in book III (pp. 14-19) concerns the effects of the content on a reader (you might recall the concerns of the two parts of the selection from book X). Finally, the last portion of this dicussion concerns the form of poetry and its recitation, distinguishing narration from imitation in the narrower sense of mimicry.
• The discussion of music in a more literal sense is divided into, first (pp. 23-25), a discussion of harmony (in particular, the choice of scales),* and then a brief discussion (pp. 25-26) of rhythm.
* If you are familiar with musical “modes,” you may notice some familiar names in the discussion of melody, but that is the result of an application, beginning in the Middle Ages, of ancient Greek terminology to scales that may be quite different from those Plato would have had in mind; in particular, while modes in the modern sense could be played using the white keys of a piano, some of the ancient Greek scales have two consecutive half tones (so black keys would be needed) and even quarter-tone steps (so some notes would fall between piano keys).
• This is followed (pp. 27-29) by a more general discussion of style in all of the arts.
As you read the discussion literature, think how it might fit with the concerns about imitation (in the broad sense, not merely mimicry) that were raised in book X. The discussion of music and the following discussion of the arts concerns not what is imitated (in the broad sense) but what is expressed. Do any of the concerns of book X apply to expression? If so, which ones and how do they apply?