Symposium - AIC

Giuseppe Cambiano
shortness are unimportant, provided the speech seizes tò on (172 d 8-9). But significantly in the
Symposium the author of the content of the long speech, reported by Socrates, is Diotima, not
Socrates himself, as it occurs also in the Timaeus.
However in the Symposium there is another person who delivers a long speech, whose
content is for the most part a report of past events: it is Alcibiades’ speech, that constitutes the
pendant of Socrates’ report. It is the well-known story of his relations with Socrates, having its climax
in the closed space of Socrates and Alcibiades in the same bed and in the open spaces of the military
expeditions, at Potidaea and Delion, between 432 and 424 b.C (217 a-221 c). Alcibiades is conscious
of Socrates’ atopia, but he does not understand the peculiar character of the Socratic dialectic. He
interprets the effects of Socrates’ speeches on his audience in terms of fascination, as a sort of passive
condition and paralysis, which reminds us Gorgias’ views, that is a rhetorical horizon. It is not by any
chance that Alcibiades refers to a competitive context, where the most important thing is to win and
to overpower the opponents. Therefore he appeals to the physical contact as a mean to dominate
Socrates. But the emphasis on the physical contact shows that Alcibiades is very far from the
ascending process described by Diotima recurring to a terminology taken from the mysteries
(Riedweg). The apex is constituted by the contemplation of the beautiful itself, described also
metaphorically as ephaptesthai the truth (212 a 3-5), that obviously is not a physical contact. On the
contrary, Socrates proves that he has learned from Diotima, when he arrives at the banquet and
Agathon makes him sitting beside himself in order to benefit from Socrates’ wise discovery by the
help of this physical contact (haptomenos) (175 c 7-d 2). But Socrates replies that it would be very
useful if sophia could flow from the fuller to the emptier individual simply by a physical reciprocal
contact (haptometha) (175 d 3-e 6). This is the aspect that is not understood by Alcibiades, who
however is reporting the story of his relations with Socrates. This confirms, in my opinion, that an
oral hypomnema can express also a philosophical misunderstanding and represent persons who
remain temporarily or always far away or on the threshold of philosophy. And the Platonic dialogues
too, as written products, display the same circumstances, in the interrelations of common beliefs,
reports, myths, refutation and philosophical arguments.
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