Our drive for human connection has been forever fueled by desire to seek love, truth, and wisdom, and to share that information with one another in our quest and pursuit of happiness. Our society is shaped by the process and product of every interaction, both between people, and man and nature. Some sexual, and non-sexual relationships that form between human interaction are better than others for us as individuals, morally and spiritually. In the very old works of ancient Greek poets, Sappho and Plato, we are offered different approaches and insights on the mysteries of love, eros, and the true meaning and desire of human interaction, sexually and non-sexually. By looking at some of Sappho and Plato’s specific works, we can see …show more content…
It was the first time in the era of Epic poems that a poet, male or female, didn’t write about heroes of war, but chose to explore intense personal feelings and emotions of love. This kind of style of writing hadn’t been seen in the world ever at that time. Sappho’s work includes simple lyric style language that delivers vivid images, and awakens intense, influential feelings. As much of her work was burned and destroyed, due to her being exiled, we are left with the work of Sappho in mostly fragmentations and not in their full form. For example, in Sappho’s fragment 48, ‘You came and I was crazy for you and you cooled my mind that burned with longing,’ (Puchner) we see a great awareness of self, generating a fierce fire of desire that occurs frequently within the interiority of Sappho’s writing. Her cry-to- the-heart style lyric poems deliver simple, direct, and honest lines that really get across to the reader with an overwhelming power of love. Sappho didn’t censor, nor simplify love. Sappho’s was not afraid to express feelings of homosexuality or heterosexuality within her work, and most of her …show more content…
Yet, even in our modern times, we have to agree that Sappho is nothing more than correct when she suggests the ultimate goal in life is to seek, in pursuit of happiness and truth, and hold on to that of what you love. Sappho also describes some interactions of love as “sweetbitter,” eluding to this idea of pleasure first, followed by pain. ‘Eros the melter of limbs (now again) stirs me- sweet bitter unmanageable creature who steals in.’ (Puchner) By far, this fragment delivers so much truth, that even after thousands of years the concept is still true. Most of us all have been in some form of relationship where it starts out great, life couldn’t be better, but then everything erupts and falls apart, leaving you to feel all the pain and heartbreak that comes with love and desire. Plato’s outlook on love is very similar to the works of Sappho, yet adds to it, offering more dimensions. In The Symposium, which reads like a post modern text, Plato distances himself from the actual work itself, by delivering many messages through several characters, all based on real people. It is through these characters that Plato sets a frame form narrative, in which sends you as a reader penetrating further and further
In the poems, “EΡΩΣ” by Robert Bridges and “Eros” by Anne Stevenson both have similar yet distinct concepts of the God of love. “EΡΩΣ” describes the concept of love as being conflicted between humans view of Eros as the god of love and lust; where as Stevenson’s poem describes Eros as being bruised and beat up as a result of this constant misunderstanding by humanity. Thus, both poems are similar with their description of Eros’ constant struggles with human nature. “EΡΩΣ” by Robert Bridges has a contradictory concept of what humans view as love, thus the negative and positive comparisons are between Eros different angles in love and lust. For instance, Eros is described as both having “exuberant flesh so fair” yet
Socrates a classical Greek philosopher and character of Plato’s book Phaedo, defines a philosopher as one who has the greatest desire of acquiring knowledge and does not fear death or the separation of the body from the soul but should welcome it. Even in his last days Socrates was in pursuit of knowledge, he presents theories to strengthen his argument that the soul is immortal. His attempts to argue his point can’t necessarily be considered as convincing evidence to support the existence of an immortal soul.
It is well known that Plato, a devoted student of Socrates, chronicled many of Socrates' speeches and conversations. Every so often one can find instances where Socrates and other players in these conversations seem to contradict themselves, or at least muddle their arguments. One such occurrence of this is in Plato's Symposium and Plato's Phaedrus. Both texts speak of love in its physical sense, both texts describe love and its effects, and both discuss how it is best realized, yet they do this in very different fashions, and for different reasons.
truth that fixes our existence. He said it best in his own words, "I will . . .
Euthyphro, is one of the many dialogues that was written by the Greek philosopher Plato dicussion the quest for wisdom by his mentor, Socrates. The time that The Euthyphro takes place is doing the time of a trial that Socrates is in regarding some here say that he was corrupting the youth of Athens, and ultimately leads to his demise. It is very important issue due to the system Socrates used to try to understand wisdom, and gives some input on his and Plato's view on holiness altogether. In all, the Euthyphro is a view of how the Socratic way of getting wisdom works and it enters into what Socrates and Plato define holiness as.
I am often bombarded with a seven word question in life as I am sure many other people are. “What is your ultimate goal in life?” Many answers may differ, but my answer seems to always be the same; to seek happiness. If one can’t seek happiness what is the point of living? If you are miserable all the time and not living life with a positive mindset is there any so called “value” to your life? I’m not saying that you have to be happy all of the time because that is hard to achieve. Sometimes there are so called “punishments” in order to seek happiness, but once one achieves happiness it is a feeling that is indescribable.
Happiness. People go to any means by which to obtain the many varied materials and issues
O’Higgins, Dolores. “Sappho’s Splintered Tongue: Silence in Sappho 31 and Catullus 51.” Re-reading Sappho: Reception and Transmission. Ed. Ellen Greene. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1996. Print.
Wisdom, in my opinion, is the ultimate goal in life. I agree with Tom Robbins and Switters in saying that these attributes are composed within wisdom, but I believe that good judgement is also
happiness, and can lead to the choice of death over life. Hopefully, we will fully
Sappho, as seen in poem 16 when she states that Helen went sailing for Troy not for her children or parents, but for love, implies that love is of utmost importance, more so even than one’s family. Sappho attempts to portray love realistically; with both the joy and pain that love brings to one’s life. In poem 31, Sappho focuses on the sharp pain love is capable of bestowing on someone. Sappho first speaks bitterly about the man talking to the women she loves. After recounting the passion she feels for this women, Sappho then discusses how she feels as if her despair might kill her. The jealousy expressed in this poem is one of the many woeful consequences of
Just as this genre exemplifies the masculine ideal, it also promotes the feminine ideal, largely by casting female characters who do not meet this ideal in an antagonistic light, and thus maintains the male-dominant system of the societies which produced these works. This paper therefore argues that female characters in epic poetry, namely The Epic of Gilgamesh, Homer’s Odyssey, and Vergil’s Aeneid, play the role of an antagonistic “Other” group by employing their agency to act beyond the established gender roles of their societies, thereby disrupting the social order and creating obstacles for the male protagonists.
By means of this her work shows enamour for unusual remnants that the society saw as useless understood by their actions of discarding these and offers a new strongly held perspective that allows us to see into the perspective of the world from a different angle, that at time was not seen as a tradition.
By writing Symposium, Plato uses six characters to convey his idea of Love, the process of learning and thinking in a philosophical way. Each of these characters has a particular mission to elaborate different spheres of Love. However, these speeches given by six characters are not totally independent. They, to some extent, are connected; some of them agree or disagree with the previous one; some of them improve the idea of the former speakers. In conclusion, according to Symposium, Love is multi-faced.
with some very different views of love as brought to us by Agathon, Phaedrus and