In Philosophy as Agon: A Study of Plato's Gorgias and Related Texts, Robert Metcalf offers a fresh interpretation of Plato's dialogues as dramatic texts whose philosophy is not so much a matter of doctrine as it is a dynamic, nondogmatic, and open-ended practice of engaging others in agonistic dialogue. Metcalf challenges prevailing interpretations according to which the agon (contest or struggle) between the interlocutors in the dialogues is inessential to Plato's philosophical purpose, or simply a reflection of the cultural background of ancient Greek life. Instead, he argues that Plato...
In Philosophy as Agon: A Study of Plato's Gorgias and Related Texts, Robert Metcalf offers a fresh interpretation of Plato's dialogues as dramatic tex...