Walter T. Schmid offers the first original interpretation of the Laches since Hermann Bonitz in the nineteenth century in the only full-length commentary on the Laches available in English.
Schmid divides the book into five main discussions: the historical background of the dialogue; the relation of form and content in a Platonic dialogue and specific structural and aesthetic features of the Laches; the first half of the dialogue, which introduces the characters and considers the theme of the education of young men; the inquiry with Laches, which examines the traditional Greek conception of military courage; and the inquiry with Nicias in which two nontraditional conceptions of courage are mooted, one closely associated with the sophistic movement in Athens, the other with Socrates himself. Furnishing a detailed paragraph-by-paragraph reading that traces Socrates' ongoing quest for virtue and wisdom-- a wisdom founded in the action of a whole human life-- Schmid conclusively shows how and why the Laches fills an important niche in Plato's moral theory.
- ISBN10 0585186480
- ISBN13 9780585186481
- Publish Date 14 May 2014 (first published 24 July 1992)
- Publish Status Active
- Publish Country US
- Imprint Southern Illinois University Press
- Format eBook
- Pages 241
- Language English