The Purpose of the Introductory Dialogue (Prompt 1)

In Plato's Symposium, several philosophers have a friendly conversation about the significance of the god Love. A man named Aristodemus once relayed this discussion to Apollodorus who does the same in the Symposium to another man named Glaucon. Finally, Plato passes on the same ideas to the reader via the Symposium. Thus, the meaning of Love at the core of the Symposium is interpreted by philosophers, then Aristodemus, then Apollodorus, then Plato, then us. This multitude of frames around an idea of truth about Love points to the importance of interpretation in the Symposium.

Each thinker - Phaedrus, Pausanius, Eryximachus, Aristophanes, Agathon, Socrates, Diotima, Alcibiades - has his own opinion of the nature of Love. Each man's view of Love may have components of another's, for they agree on certain points, but is in its entirety unique. The distinctive nature of each philosopher's thoughts on Love often motivates them to reject each other's ideas or modify parts of their own. Nevertheless, each philosopher remains convinced of a unique, composite view on Love.

Thus, we begin with multiple, varied interpretations of the same concept of Love. In relaying such views to Glaucon, Aristodemus and Apollodorus can both be assumed to influence them: it is highly doubtful that they remembers each man's speech, especially if the conversation took place years ago when they were all "still children" (2). Plato, then, has the ability to alter Apollodorus' version and Arisodemus' version as well as all the ideas of the philosophers. As readers, we have the freedom to accept or reject (parts of) Plato's ideas about Apollodorus' ideas about Aristodemus' ideas about the philosophers' ideas.

This filtering of ideas ideas through various interpretations - that the Symposium emphasizes so with multiple layers and the Introductory Dialogue - does not insinuate that there is no one true essence of Love. It rather suggests that one meaning of Love (and of any subject, for that matter) is unattainable, and that all Love can do for us is found in these honorable attempts to understand it. The process of comprehension - not the arrival at one definition - is the focus of the Symposium.

In Apollodorus' story in the Introductory Dialogue, one character Agathon seats himself next to Socrates so that he "may catch a bit of the wisdom that came to (him)" (5). But Sophocles responds: "How wonderful it would be, dear Agathon, if the foolish were filled with wisdom simply by touching the wise" (5). The physical action of 'touching' is not enough to gain wisdom; it takes thought and time. Similarly, the meaning of Love cannot be simply transmitted to the philosophers, then Aristodemus, Apollodorus, Plato and us. Meaning, like wisdom, is ephemeral, existing only in men's attempts to attain it.