- Published: 7 April 2003
- ISBN: 9780140449273
- Imprint: Penguin Classics
- Format: Paperback
- Pages: 144
- RRP: $22.99
The Symposium
Following the overwhelming success of Great Ideas' launch, with a million sold in the UK alone, Penguin now publish a further 20 short, astonishing works of non-fiction drawn from the most remarkable writing of the past two and a half thousand years of human thinking.
In the course of a lively drinking party, a group of Athenian intellectuals exchange views on eros, or desire. From their conversation emerge a series of subtle reflections on gender roles, sex in society and the sublimation of basic human instincts. The discussion culminates in a radical challenge to conventional views by Plato's mentor, Socrates, who advocates transcendence through spiritual love. The Symposium is a deft interweaving of different viewpoints and ideas about the nature of love - as a response to beauty, a cosmic force, a motive for social action and as a means of ethical education.
- Published: 7 April 2003
- ISBN: 9780140449273
- Imprint: Penguin Classics
- Format: Paperback
- Pages: 144
- RRP: $22.99