How Phaedrus drew on The Iliad
A documented line of influence: Plato demonstrably engaged Homer’s work. The commentary below is Gröblé’s, verbatim from each work’s page.
The source
The Iliad
Homer · c. 750 BCE
Ancient GreeceThe influenced
Phaedrus
Plato · c. 370 BCE
Ancient GreeceRelevance
5/10
On Phaedrus’s page
- Plato treats the Iliad as the epic authority in the room — his dialogues quote it some 91 times, and the Phaedrus itself reworks a Homeric hexameter at 241d
- Socrates's great palinode is set against Homer's telling of Helen: the Iliad is the version of the story he must take back
- Come to the Phaedrus with Homer fresh and you feel the recantation — Plato wrestling with the poet who educated all of Greece
On The Iliad’s page
- Homer was "the educator of Hellas," and Plato's dialogues quote the Iliad some 91 times — it's the epic authority his Socrates keeps reckoning with
- In the Phaedrus, Plato sets Socrates's palinode against Homer's telling of Helen and even adapts a Homeric hexameter mid-dialogue
- The Iliad is the inherited tradition Socrates must recant before he can speak rightly about love