Dear Fellow Readers and Lovers of Learning,
What happens when thoughtful friends gather to explore life’s deepest questions? Plato’s Symposium shows us one such evening of intellectual feasting—and it’s this spirit of shared inquiry that animates our own community.
This is where our name “Symposium” comes from. Much like our own reading pathways, the dialogue presents a community engaged in slow, thoughtful exploration of life’s deepest questions.
The Symposium’s structure itself mirrors our practice of collaborative conversational reading. Each speaker builds upon, challenges, or reframes the ideas presented before them, creating a rich tapestry of perspectives on love (eros). This progressive deepening of understanding through dialogue is precisely what we aim for in our reading circles.pathways.
The Value of Multiple Perspectives
Consider how the Symposium presents six distinct speeches about love, each offering a different way into this fundamental human experience:
– Phaedrus, sees love as a motivating force for noble actions
– Pausanias, the lawyer, distinguishes between common and heavenly love
– Eryximachus, the doctor, views love as a cosmic force of harmony
– Aristophanes, the comic poet, presents love as the search for our other half (My favorite one, next to Socrates’)
– Agathon, a famous tragic poet who just won a great award the previous evening) praises love’s beauty and virtue
– Socrates, through Diotima, reveals love as the desire for permanent possession of the good
-Alcibiades (the guy who led Athens to disaster against the Spartans, that guy) relates how Socrates snubbed him when he tried to take a move.
This multiplicity of viewpoints reminds us why we read in community. Each member brings their unique perspective, helping us see aspects of the text we might have missed on our own. The difference is that rather than present speeches in order, we simply have a good conversation – which ‘holds secrets like love and liquor’, said Seneca. The spontaneity of the conversation with multiple participants yields surprising insights you just can’t get in any other way.
The Ladder of Love: A Journey We Take Together
Diotima’s famous “ladder of love,” as related by Socrates, begins with the love of a single beautiful body and ascends gradually to the love of beauty itself. This journey from the particular to the universal parallels our own experience in slow reading.
We often begin with our individual responses to a text—our personal connections and interpretations. Through dialogue with others, our understanding expands, becoming more universal and profound.
Slow Reading as an Act of Love
When Socrates challenges Agathon’s speech, he doesn’t dismiss it outright but engages in careful questioning. This method of gentle interrogation shows us how to read both critically and lovingly. In our conversations, we try practice this same approach—taking time to fully understand each other’s interpretations before building upon or questioning them.
The Symposium suggests that love itself is a kind of wisdom-seeking. Isn’t this exactly what we do in our conversations? We come together in our shared love of wisdom, acknowledging that none of us possesses complete understanding, but that together we might climb a few steps higher on Diotima’s ladder.
Further readings on the ways of love:
The conflicts of the human heart, the problems of love, are not new problems. It is not surprising to find so many of the very best books of the past attempting to articulate some corner of these conflicts. Here are a few reading recommendations:
“Pride and Prejudice” by Jane Austen. Does anyone else cry when they read this? I admit it and I am not ashamed. This is an examination of how love transcends prejudices and the journey from initial judgment to deep understanding. This is the novel for liberal learning.
“Don Quijote de La Mancha” by Miguel de Cervantes: explores love through Don Quijote’s peculiar obsession with Dulcinea and his friendship to Sancho Panza. (We’ll be reading this starting in April.)
“The Divine Comedy” by Dante Alighieri charts a spiritual journey guided by love, from earthly desire to divine love, with Beatrice embodying both human and divine aspects. There’s a group reading Purgatorio right now, Wednesday evenings, if you’d like to join.
“Song of Songs” from the Hebrew Bible: ancient sacred poetry celebrating both earthly and divine love, showing how the two can be interconnected
“The Aeneid” by Virgil: see particularly the tragic love story of Dido and Aeneas (it’s bad), exploring the conflict between personal love and public duty. Eric Stull’s Latin group is currently learning Latin by lovingly combing through line-by-line of the Aeneid.
“Medea” by Euripides: how love can transform into destructive passion when betrayed. This is my wife’s favorite Greek tragedy. For my part, “Medea” could be sub-titled: Jason: Don’t be Like Him…or Else!
“The Tale of Genji” by Murasaki Shikibu While not Western, this 11th-century Japanese work is one of the world’s earliest novels, offering a sophisticated exploration of courtly love. We are hoping to offer a slow reading of this one soon!
“The Letters of Abelard and Heloise” – medieval rather than ancient, these letters document one of history’s most famous love stories and its philosophical implications. I have a Penguin edition on my bookshelf that I just adore.
Looking Ahead
As we continue our pathways, we might keep in mind a few lessons from Plato’s Symposium:
– The value of multiple perspectives in illuminating truth
– The importance of building understanding progressively
– The role of friendly dialogue in deepening wisdom
– The connection between love and the pursuit of knowledge
As always, we’ll take our time, savoring each passage and allowing space for every voice to contribute to our shared understanding.