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A review by its_kievan
Republic by Plato
challenging
slow-paced
Chose not to rate this because it took me over a year to read and I was taking notes the whole time.
Crazy book. So funny that it’s considered a foundational text of political philosophy when so much of it is Socrates/Plato saying “obviously we all know that the human soul has three parts so the ideal city should have three groups” and Glaucon or whoever is like so true bestie.
Still a fascinating book to read, despite the frequent unhinged leaps of logic. The actual politics part of it was much more tangential than I was expecting: he’s not trying to describe the perfect city, he’s explaining how the perfect city would arise from the philosophical framework he’s created. The city itself is deeply bizarre, devoid of most art and poetry and guarded by a warrior caste raised from birth on propaganda. I definitely don’t agree with Plato’s politics or the philosophy underpinning them, but I can see why this is the book for so many other philosophers.
Crazy book. So funny that it’s considered a foundational text of political philosophy when so much of it is Socrates/Plato saying “obviously we all know that the human soul has three parts so the ideal city should have three groups” and Glaucon or whoever is like so true bestie.
Still a fascinating book to read, despite the frequent unhinged leaps of logic. The actual politics part of it was much more tangential than I was expecting: he’s not trying to describe the perfect city, he’s explaining how the perfect city would arise from the philosophical framework he’s created. The city itself is deeply bizarre, devoid of most art and poetry and guarded by a warrior caste raised from birth on propaganda. I definitely don’t agree with Plato’s politics or the philosophy underpinning them, but I can see why this is the book for so many other philosophers.