How The Republic 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
The Republic
Plato · c. 375 BCE
Ancient GreeceRelevance
9/10
On The Republic’s page
- The Republic's most notorious move — banishing the poets — is aimed straight at Homer, and the Iliad supplies the evidence
- Plato quotes its actual lines (Achilles defying the gods, the gods brawling) as the dangerous content to keep from the guardians
- Knowing the poem first makes the prosecution land — you can hear exactly which passages Plato thinks are too beautiful and too false to be safe
On The Iliad’s page
- Homer is the poet Plato can't stop arguing with — the Republic quotes the Iliad directly, only to put it on trial
- Books 2–3 single out specific passages — Achilles raging, the gods at war — as lies that would corrupt the city's young guardians
- Book 10 widens the indictment into a full case against Homer as the chief of the mimetic poets: the Iliad is the literature Plato wants to censor