The Reading Order of Plato’s Dialogues

William H.F. Altman

NPSA, Boston; November 11, 2010

When considering the first three tetalogies of Thrasyllus in the light of my

own reconstruction of the Reading Order of Plato’s Dialogues (hereafter
“ROPD”),1 it is difficult for me to believe he wasn’t modifying it. The chief
problem with his Euthyphro, Apology, Crito, and Phaedo quartet is that it ignores
the fact that Sophist and Statesman are interpolated between its first two
members. But these dialogues not only reappear in his Second Tetralogy but are
preceded there by Cratylus and Theaetetus, the two dialogues that precede
Euthyphro in my ROPD. And with the exception of Symposium,2 Thrasyllus
placed the three dialogues that precede Cratylus in my reconstruction (Philebus,
Phaedrus, and Parmenides) in his Third Tetralogy.3 To begin with, however, I
want to reconsider the First Tetralogy in the light of Sophist-Statesman by
proposing that just as a pair of dialogues is interpolated between Euthyphro and
Apology, so also two more pairs must be interpolated between Apology-Crito and
Crito-Phaedo. Leo Strauss is useful here: he was the first to realize that Laws,
based on the fiction of an escaping Socrates, follows Crito.4 Strauss also
grasped—and here he was not alone—that Minos-Hipparchus are a pair5 and that
the former prepares the reader for Laws.6 To these connections I add the
following: that Hipparchus is a sophist,7 Minos a statesman, 8 and that Socrates’
unnamed comrade is the jailor who bursts into tears in Phaedo.9 Putting this
together yields the following conclusion for Plato’s cycle of dialogues: Cratylus,
Theaetetus, Euthyphro, Sophist, Statesman, Apology, Hipparchus, Minos, Crito,
Laws, Epinomis, and Phaedo.
I’ve been working on reconstructing the ROPD since I was a kid and, until
recently, it’s been lonely work. But times are changing: developmentalism,
disastrous remnant of German historicism, is dying and Strauss’s influence has
helped to stir interest in anathetized dialogues like Minos and Hipparchus whose
authenticity can be proved by showing their place in the ROPD.10 Catherine
Zuckert’s book is most welcome:11 she considers all thirty-five dialogues,
arranges them in a reading order, and bases a claim for the coherence of Plato’s
dialogues on dialectical differences between his various philosophers.12 While we
disagree about the penultimate position of Laws-Epinomis,13 we both end with
Phaedo.14 But my own approach is not simply chronological and doesn’t depend
on the kind of historical detail one finds in Debra Nails,15 Christopher Planeaux, 16
and Laurence Lampert,17 who has now found another reason for placing
Protagoras first.18 Unlike Zuckert and Lampert, my ordering is pedagogical, not
simply chronological and I regard Strauss’s Aristophanic19 story of Socrates’
development as no less un-Platonic than the analyst’s story that relegates the so-
called “middle dialogues” to an outgrown stage of Plato’s development. My
pedagogical order depends on more natural connections: for example, Lysis
follows Symposium because Socrates leaves Agathon’s for the Lyceum and Lysis
discovers him journeying thither.20 In fact, the juxtaposition of Symposium and

1
2 The Reading Order of Plato’s Dialogues

Lysis illustrates the keystone of my reconstruction project: the notion of a

basanistic21 element in Plato’s dialogues, or, more roughly, the notion that Plato
wrote certain dialogues in order to test the reader.
Having revealed Platonism through Diotima, Plato tests the reader’s ability to
preserve that vision with Lysis: her Idea of Beauty solves the puzzle that arises in
Lysis about “the first friend.”22 My work owes much to Charles Kahn;23 his
reasons for regarding Lysis as “proleptic” indicate more clearly why it is really
“basanistic.”24 This is not to say that Kahn is wrong: there are dialogues that
might justly be called “proleptic,” i.e., dialogues that prepare the reader by fore-
shadowing both problems that will be solved later and solutions that still lack
clarity.25 It is a pity, for example, that Kahn regards Hippias Major as spurious; 26
it prepares the reader for Diotima by preparing the neophyte for the Idea of
Beauty.27 And Kahn is also right that Lysis, regardless of its connection with
Symposium, is proleptic with respect to Republic.28
In a set of thirty-five, the eighteenth spot is central and here I place Plato’s
masterpiece. I should make it clear that the division of Plato’s dialogues into
proleptic, visionary, and basanistic is merely convenient;29 Republic contains all
three elements as do other dialogues.30 A more natural division is between the
central Republic, the dialogues that precede it, and those that follow it in the
ROPD. With allowance for a dramatic conclusion that holds the reader’s interest
while struggling with the Eleatic and Athenian Strangers,31 it is generally true that
the dialogues that precede Republic are intended to prepare the reader for
Republic and are proleptic with respect to it while those that follow it generally
test whether the reader has embraced Platonism and is prepared to defend it.
Beginning with Timaeus-Critias, 32 then, the basanistic element dominates and it
will surprise no one who is following my argument that I place the so-called
“late” dialogues in the post-Republic half of the ROPD.33 The textual basis of this
conception is what I call “the Battle Hymn of the Republic” (534b8-d1)34 and I
take the desire Socrates expresses at the start of Timaeus to see the guardians of
his City come to life35 as fulfilled when the reader does battle with Timaeus over
the relationship between Being and Becoming.36
By following the vision of the transcendent Good with the cosmology of
Timaeus, Plato proves to be a student of Parmenides.37 Although John Palmer gets
distracted by assuming that the Eleatic Stranger speaks for Plato,38 he is dead right
on the Parmenidean basis of Socrates’ discussion of Being, non-Being, and
Becoming in Republic V.39 Plato’s Timaeus corresponds to Parmenides’ “Way of
Opinion”40 and Plato’s basanistic pedagogy is Parmenidean: the reader is once
again exposed to “the deceptive cosmos of my words.”41 My Plato is and remains
a Platonist [here I would like to pause in remembrance of all that was lost in that
terrible War that ended on the eleventh day of the eleventh month] and I question
whether there are any Platonic Ideas apart from the Good, the Beautiful, and the
Just.42 Having interposed an eternal plateau43 between intelligible Being and the
phenomenal world of Becoming44—the theoretical part of Plato’s project—the
“ideas” of couch,45 shuttle,46 and man,47 like the abstractions of mathematics,48 do
not belong on the highest or dialectical part of the Divided Line.49 As for the
3 William Altman

practical part of Plato’s project, the philosopher grasps it when, having been
attracted to the Good by falling in love with Beauty, she practices Justice by
going back down to the cave to do battle with Thrasymachus,50 Timaeus,51
Critias,52 the Eleatic,53 and the Athenian Strangers,54 battle hymn ringing in her
ears. So determined is Plato to test his chosen readers that he even uses a
charmless Socrates to test the reader’s grasp of the otherworldly Good in
Philebus55 after the ROPD falls off the end of the earth in Critias;56 he will not
even let her rest in the charming Phaedrus that follows it, where Socrates rightly
offers his auditors a palinode for having just spoken falsely.57 From the apolitical
Phaedrus,58 we move on to Parmenides and Cratylus,59 a pair that unites the two
pre-Socratics who influenced Plato most and this brings us back to where the end
begins.
Plato’s stock in trade is not the tetralogy but the dyad: in addition to Timaeus-
Critias, Philebus-Phaedrus, Sophist-Statesman, Hipparchus-Minos, and Laws-
Epinomis,60 there are the obvious pairs named for Alcibiades and Hippias. The
clearest evidence that the ancient Platonists who sought for the ROPD did not
grasp what they were looking for is that none placed the childishly simple
Alcibiades Major first on pedagogical grounds.61 It is because Alcibiades uses an
argument he heard from Protagoras that we discover that Plato introduced his
dialogues with Protagoras,62 probably by means of a dramatic performance that
brought the glory of pre-War Athens to life.63 Are all virtues one?64 Are there four
virtues or five?65 By introducing these problems, Plato prepared his auditors to
recognize that it is not only geometry and arithmetic that rest on unproven
assumptions while making use of images:66 the entire Shorter Way with its
tripartite soul,67 its four and only four virtues,68 and its anticlimactic definitions of
justice in City and Man,69 has the ultimate purpose of creating a dialogue between
the reader, the Good, and the Idea of Justice,70 a dialogue that begins in Book V,71
persuades the reader to re-enter the Cave in accordance with the Longer Way,72
and climaxes in the realization that Justice requires the philosopher to perform
two jobs73 even if the worldly consequence of this decision is hemlock.74 Having
confused them in Protagoras with the self-seeking hedonism of a unitary virtue
based on knowledge,75 Plato the teacher leads them step by step to the generous
vision vouchsafed by Diotima in Symposium,76 itself half-way between
Protagoras and Republic.
As a public high school teacher, I love the first quarter of the ROPD, freshman
year in Plato’s Academy. The greatest single mistake academics make about Plato
is to imagine him as a university professor writing scholarly articles: the Academy
was more like a high school and his students, apart from the girls who snuck in,77
were boys.78 They identified with Alcibiades79 and laughed through their tears at
Hippias.80 Between these pairs, they staged81 Rival Lovers, where a dumb jock is
juxtaposed with a know-it-all.82 In the Greater Hippias, Socrates openly lies: the
neighbor that nettles him is himself.83 And then Plato lies in Lesser Hippias: it is
Hippias, man of knowledge, who can find no plausible grounds for preferring
Achilles to the deceitful Odysseus, 84 as Socrates proved he did in Apology.85
Plato’s strategy in Protagoras begins to become clear: Socrates performs a
4 The Reading Order of Plato’s Dialogues

reductio on the sophist’s assumption that knowledge is the good because he

knows that knowledge is not enough.86 My favorite dialogue is Ion, joined to
Lesser Hippias by Homer87 and to Menexenus by the skilful words of a spell-
binding general.88 In Ion, Socrates introduces mysticism and divine
dispensation,89 parts of Plato that moderns find even more repellent than his
Platonism. Can anyone read the great speech of Socrates in Ion and fail to realize
that Socrates himself was inspired90 and Plato a poet?91 Well, of course we can.
But perhaps a few will agree that the best explanation for the glaring anachronism
in Menexenus is that no student was allowed to attend a performance of the sexy
Symposium who did not know Thucydides and Xenophon well enough to spot it.92
Without that knowledge, it is impossible see why Symposium is just as tragic as it
is comic.93
From here, I must hasten back to the middle, to Republic. The four virtues on
which its Shorter Way depends are introduced in four dialogues sandwiched
between two that confront the problem of virtue in general.94 After having being
waylaid in Lysis, Socrates arrives at the Lyceum in Euthydemus.95 Although he
never sees the eristics fighting in armor, Laches begins after just such a display.96
Next comes the more difficult Charmides97 where Plato introduces his family.98
He introduces himself in Gorgias,99 a dialogue every student would assume is
about justice if they had not yet heard Republic.100 And every student should
answer the following question: is it possible that Callicles changed his mind or
does he necessarily remain immune to Socratic eloquence? A dogmatic assertion
in the negative should disqualify the respondent from setting up shop as a teacher
of Plato;101 Aristotle is their man. In Callicles, Aristocles son of Ariston shows the
reader who he was before he became Plato and any reader who is not persuaded
that it is better to suffer an injustice than to do one102 is never going to realize why
true Platonists follow Socrates back down into the Cave.103 Theages continues to
foreshadow Socrates’ trial104 while reminding us of the divine element in Socratic
education;105 Plato knew full well that it was never his own doing when a student
had the humanity to recollect that even a Callicles can repent.106 And after Meno
comes Cleitophon, the dialogue that challenges Socrates to tell us what to do
next,107 the question he begins to answer with “I went down.”
This is as good a place to stop as any because the cycle of dialogues that ends
at night with a rooster108 begins again before cockcrow109 with the erstwhile
student now prepared to teach Protagoras.110 As for me, I prefer to conclude with
what I have long dreamed of saying, and for that, I need no script: [the ROPD; see
handout].
5 William Altman

The Reading Order of Plato’s Dialogues (ROPD)

1. Protagoras
2. Alcibiades Major
3. Alcibiades Minor
4. Rival Lovers
5. Hippias Major
6. Hippias Minor
7. Ion
8. Menexenus
9. Symposium
10. Lysis
11. Euthydemus
12. Laches
13. Charmides
14. Gorgias
15. Theages
16. Meno
17. Cleitophon
18. Republic
19. Timaeus
20. Critias
21. Philebus
22. Phaedrus
23. Parmenides
24. Cratylus
25. Theaetetus
26. Euthyphro
27. Sophist
28. Statesman
29. Apology
30. Hipparchus
31. Minos
32. Crito
33. Laws
34. Epinomis
35. Phaedo
6 The Reading Order of Plato’s Dialogues

Notes

This subject of this talk is treated more thoroughly in my “The Reading Order of
Plato’s Dialogues,” forthcoming in Phoenix 64 (2010).
1
For Thrasyllus and reading order, see Michael Dunn, “The Organization of
the Platonic Corpus Between the First and Second Century A.D.” (Ph.D.
dissertation, Yale University, 1974) and “Iamblichus, Thrasyllus, and the
Reading order of the Platonic Dialogues.” in R. Baine Harris ed., Studies in
Neoplatonism: Ancient and Modern, Volume I (Albany, 1976).
2
A dialogue Thrasyllus joined with Phaedrus on thematic (i.e., erotic)
grounds; cf. his similar decision to join Hipparchus and Amatores in the Fourth
Tetralogy, connected as they are by rivalry in boy-love. In addition to the Eighth
(Cleitophon, Republic, Timaeus, Critias), his Seventh Tetralogy (Hippias Major,
Hippias Minor, Ion, Menexenus) anticipates (or preserves) the ROPD.
3
Parmenides, Philebus, Symposium, Phaedrus.
4
In addition to Leo Strauss, The Argument and the Action of Plato’s Laws
(Chicago, 1975), 2; What Is Political Philosophy? (Glencoe, 1959), 33; and
Studies in Platonic Political Philosophy (Chicago 1983), 65; see Strauss to Jacob
Klein, 12 December 1938 at Gesammelte Schriften III (Stuttgart-Weimar, 2002),
562 (translation mine): “The Laws rests on the fiction that Socrates has fled from
the prison! The gap for the Laws (the gap through which Socrates escapes to
Crete—) is expressly indicated in Crito. Thus there exists no ‘earlier and later’ in
Plato’s writings.”
5
The best work on the subject postdates Strauss: see David Mulroy, “The
Subtle Artistry of the Minos and the Hipparchus,” Transactions of the American
Philological Association 137 (2007), 115-131. Strauss makes the claim in
Liberalism Ancient and Modern (New York, 1968), 74-5; cf. Paul Friedländer,
Platon (Berlin-Leipzig, 1928-30).
6
As recognized by Strauss (Liberalism Ancient and Modern, 65), this was
Thrasyllus’ view; see his Eighth Tetralogy. For more thorough discussions, see
Mulroy and Glenn R. Morrow, Plato’s Cretan City: A Historical Interpretation of
Plato’s Laws (Princeton, 1960), 35-39.
7
Hipparchus 228b4-228e7; Socrates emphasizes wisdom while avoiding the
term “sophist.” The Eleatic Stranger does the opposite.
8
Minos 321b1-4; Socrates emphasizes law-giving while avoiding the term
“statesman.” The Eleatic Stranger does the opposite.
9
Phaedo 116d2-7; the two have had discussions (d6).
10
My application of this approach is unpublished but I would be happy to
share “Reading Order and Authenticity: The Place of Theages and Cleitophon in
Platonic Pedagogy” with interested parties; for Strauss’s influence, see Thomas
Pangle (ed.), The Roots of Platonic Political Philosophy: Ten Forgotten Socratic
Dialogues, Translated, with Interpretive Essays (Ithaca, 1987).
11
Catherine Zuckert, Plato’s Philosophers: The Coherence of the Dialogues
(Chicago, 2009); my review of this important book is found in Polis 27 n. 1
(2010), 147-150.
7 William Altman

12
Zuckert, Plato’s Philosophers, 30-48. This understanding is anticipated by
Cicero; consider curricula multiplicium variorumque sermonum (Orator 12) and
multiplex at Tusculan Disputations 5.11, passages I consider in “Womanly
Humanism in Cicero’s Tusculan Disputations.” Transactions of the American
Philological Association 139 (2009), 411-445 at 422-6 and 435-6.
13
Cf. Zuckert, Plato’s Philosophers, 51-146 and my forthcoming “A Tale of
Two Drinking Parties: Plato’s Laws in Context,” Polis 27 no. 2 (2010).
14
On Phaedo, see Zuckert, Plato’s Philosophers, 765-814. But her adherence
to “fictive chronology” (see Charles L. Griswold Jr. “E Pluribus Unum? On the
Platonic ‘Corpus.’” Ancient Philosophy 19 (1999), 361-397 at 387) forces her to
consider Menexenus last (815-26; see also 432 n. 27 and 434 n. 31).
15
Debra Nails, The People of Plato: A Prosopography of Plato and Other
Socratics (Indianapolis, 2002), especially 307-330.
16
In addition to Laurence Lampert and Christopher Planeaux, “Who’s Who in
Plato’s Timaeus-Critias and Why,” Review of Metaphysics 52 (1998), 87-125, see
Christopher Planeaux, “Socrates, Alcibiades, and Plato’s ta poteideatika: Does
Charmides Have a Historical Setting?” Mnemosyne 52 (1999), 72-77 and “The
Date of Bendis’ Entry into Attica,” Classical Journal 96 (2000), 165-192.
17
Laurence Lampert, How Philosophy Became Socratic: A Study of Plato’s
Protagoras, Charmides, and Republic (Chicago, 2010); my review of this
important book is forthcoming in Polis 28 n. 1 (2011).
18
Lampert, How Philosophy Became Socratic, 141-4.
19
In addition to Leo Strauss, Socrates and Aristophanes (New York, 1966),
see “The Problem of Socrates” in Thomas Pangle (ed.), The Rebirth of Classical
Political Rationalism (Chicago, 1989), especially 117-34. Catherine Zuckert,
Post-Modern Platos (Chicago, 1996), 132-64 is a useful overview; see also my
forthcoming The German Stranger: Leo Strauss and National Socialism (Lanham,
2010), Chapter 9.
20
Cf. Symposium 223d10 and Lysis 203a1.
21
Gorgias 486d2-7; cf. E.R. Dodds, Plato, Gorgias (Oxford, 1959), 280.
Consider Republic VII 537b5, c6, d5, and 540a1.
22
Lysis 219c5-d2; see “The Reading Order of Plato’s Dialogues,” Section 3.
23
See Charles H. Kahn, “Did Plato Write Socratic Dialogues?” Classical
Quarterly, 31 (1981), 305-20, “Plato’s Charmides and the Proleptic Reading of
Socratic Dialogues” Journal of Philosophy 85 (1988), 541-549, 1993. “Proleptic
Composition in the Republic, or Why Book 1 Was Never a Separate Dialogue,”
Classical Quarterly 43 n.s. (1993), 131-42, and Plato and the Socratic Dialogue:
The Philosophical Use of Literary Form (Cambridge, 1996).
24
See Kahn, Plato and the Socratic Dialogue, 281-91, especially 283: “It [sc.
‘the appearance of paradox or contradiction’ in Lysis] is a challenge to us, the
readers, to pick our way through the traps he [sc. Plato] has set.”
25
See Kahn, Plato and the Socratic Dialogue, 47-8 and 59-70; for Kahn’s
increasing dissatisfaction with the term “proleptic,” see Charles H. Kahn,
“Response to Griswold” Ancient Philosophy 20 (2000), 189-93 at 190.
8 The Reading Order of Plato’s Dialogues

26
Kahn, “Did Plato Write Socratic Dialogues,” 308 n. 10 and Plato and the
Socratic Dialogue, 182.
27
Cf. Symposium 211d3 and Hippias Major 288a9.
28
Kahn, Plato and the Socratic Dialogue, 266-7.
29
See “The Reading Order of Plato’s Dialogues,” Section 2.
30
The fullest discussion of the presence of all three elements in Republic I is
available in Section 8 of my unpublished ms. “Plato the Teacher: The Crisis of the
Republic.”
31
By interpolating Sophist-Statesman before Apology and Laws-Epinomis
before Phaedo, Plato gives any student who reads the dialogues in accordance
with the ROPD compelling reasons not to quit (cf. Republic VII 535b1-8); in
other words, if nobody could read Phaedo who had not already read Laws, Laws
would be much more widely read than it is today.
32
Although the discussion summarized at Timaeus 17c1-19b2 is clearly not
Republic, Plato’s intent is merely to reveal Reading Order, i.e., that Timaeus is to
be read immediately after reading Republic. Aware of the discrepancy between
the summary and the substance, the student who yearns for the Idea of the Good
(Timaeus 19a8) begins reading the discourse of Timaeus knowing from the start
that the entire conversation is predicated on the evisceration of the Longer Way.
33
A pervasive confusion about Reading Order and “Plato’s Development” is
ultimately responsible for the strong cases made by both sides in the debate
between Harold Cherniss, who justly upholds the case for Plato’s Platonism in
“The Relation of the Timaeus to Plato’s Later Dialogues,” American Journal of
Philology 78 (1957), 225-266 and G.E.L. Owen, who wants to save a post-
Platonism Plato (cf. Gilbert Ryle, “Plato’s ‘Parmenides’ (II.),” Mind n.s. (1939),
302-325, especially 315) by noting justly the connections, best explained by the
ROPD, between Republic and Timaeus in “The Place of Timaeus in Plato’s Later
Dialogues,” American Journal of Philology (1957), 225-266.
34
Republic VII 534b8-d6 (Shorey’s translation modified): “And is not this
true of the good [τοῦ ἀγαθοῦ] likewise—that the man who is unable to define
[διορίσασθαι] in his discourse [τῷ λόγῳ] and distinguish and abstract from all
other things [ἀπὸ τῶν ἄλλων πάντων ἀφελὼν] the aspect or idea of the good
[τὴν τοῦ ἀγαθοῦ ἰδέαν] and who cannot, as if in battle [καὶ ὥσπερ ἐν µάχῃ],
through all refutations emerging [διὰ πάντων ἐλέγχων διεξιών], not eager to
refute by recourse to opinion but to essence [μὴ κατὰ δόξαν ἀλλὰ κατ᾽ οὐσίαν
προθυμούμενος ἐλέγχειν], proceeding throughout [διαπορεύηται] in all of
these [ἐν πᾶσι τούτοις] [sc. refutations] with the discourse untoppled [ἀπτῶτι
τῷ λόγῳ]—the man who lacks this power, you will say, does not really know the
good itself [αὐτὸ τὸ ἀγαθὸν] or any particular good [οὔτε ἄλλο ἀγαθὸν
οὐδέν] but if he joins himself in any way to some image [ἀλλ᾽ εἴ πῃ εἰδώλου
τινὸς ἐφάπτεται] he does so by reputation but not knowledge [δόξῃ, οὐκ
ἐπιστήμῃ ἐφάπτεσθαι].” This passage will be given to the auditors as a handout.
9 William Altman

35
Timaeus 19b3-c8; cf. Kathryn A. Morgan, “Narrative Orders in the Timaeus
and Critias” in Richard D. Mohr and Barbara M. Sattler (eds.), One Book, the
Whole Universe: Plato’s Timaeus Today (Las Vegas, 2010), 267-285 at 268-72.
36
Timaeus 31b3; cf. A.E. Taylor, A Commentary on Plato’s Timaeus (Oxford,
1928), 86 (ad loc.): “The words should be carefully noted. In the earlier Platonic
dialogues (for example in Rep. V) ge/nesij and ou0sia are placed in sharp
antithesis to each other as indeed they are by Timaeus himself at 27d6ff. In the
Philebus we find a maturer doctrine according to which there is a positive relation
between them.”
37
In addition to Alexander P.D. Mourelatos, The Route of Parmenides.
Revised and Expanded Edition (Las Vegas, 2008), 222-63, see the earlier
contributions of G.E.L. Owen, “Eleatic Questions.” Classical Quarterly n.s. 10
(1960), 84-102 and A.A. Long, “The Principles of Parmenides’ Cosmology.”
Phronesis 8 (1963), 90-107.
38
John A. Palmer, Plato’s Reception of Parmenides (Oxford, 1999), 151.
39
Palmer, Plato’s Reception of Parmenides, 31-55.
40
Cf. John Burnet, Early Greek Philosophy. 4th Edition (London, 1930), 182-
6 and Taylor, Commentary on Timaeus, viii-ix, 18-9.
41
Parmenides B8.52 (DK; translation mine); see Mourelatos, Route of
Parmenides, 226 and Ulrich von Wilamowitz-Möllendorff, “Lesefrüchte.”
Hermes 34 (1899), 203-230 at 203.
42
In addition to Epistles VII.342d4-5, see Republic VII.520c5-6, Parmenides
130b7-8, and Phaedo 65d4-7; on the latter passage, see Verity Harte, “Plato’s
Metaphysics” in Gail Fine (ed.), Oxford Handbook to Plato (Oxford, 2008), 191-
216 at 197: “Here, we have a list of examples of Forms: Just, Beautiful, Good,
Largeness, Health, and Strength. This list, in itself, is a rather odd assortment of
items, including values, a size property, and physical characteristics. It is
completed by a generalization—“all the rest”—whose scope is utterly opaque.”
43
Diogenes Laertius 3.4; see Altman, “Plato the Teacher,” Section 5.
44
Cf. Leo Strauss to Gerhard Krüger, Cambridge (U.K.), 25 December 1935
at Strauss, Gesammelte Schriften 3, 449-50 (translation mine): “Kant is really the
only Platonist among the modern philosophers.” For Kantian influence, see
Zuckert, Plato’s Philosophers, 47, 213, 232-4, 237, 243-4, 247, 268, 313, and
834-5.
45
Cf. Republic X 597b5-6 and II 372d7-e1; see Altman, “Plato the Teacher,”
Section 34.
46
Cratylus 389a6-b10.
47
The “third man” argument (Parmenides 132a6-b2) does not apply to the
Just, the Beautiful, and the Good (130b7-8); cf. Sophist 251b5-c2.
48
Aristotle, Metaphysics A.6. 987b14-18 (translation W.D. Ross): “Further,
besides the sensible things and Forms he [sc. Plato] says there are objects of
mathematics, which occupy an intermediate position [metacu/], differing from
sensible things in being eternal and unchangeable and from Forms in that there
are many alike, while the Form itself is in each case unique.”
10 The Reading Order of Plato’s Dialogues

49
Cf. Republic VI 509b4-511b2 and 511b3-c2.
50
For Socrates’ declaration that he has just become friends with
Thrasymuchus (Republic VI 498c9-d1), see Leo Strauss, The City and Man
(Chicago, 1964), 123-133. The true basis of this “friendship” is that after
defending the philosopher’s decision not to compete with the likes of
Thrasymachus (489b4-c2), Socrates first denies the possibility of Plato (494c4-7)
and then his own salutary influence on him (496d4-5); see my “Altruism and the
Art of Writing,” Humanitas 22 (2009), 69-98 at 89-98.
51
Taylor, Commentary on Timaeus, 614: “When we find T. [sc. Timaeus]
falling into inconsistency we may suspect that his creator is intentionally making
him ‘give himself away.’”
52
Particularly thought-provoking is Warman Welliver, Character, Plot and
Thought in Plato’s Timaeus-Critias (Leiden, 1977).
53
Given Heidegger’s anti-Platonism—e.g., Introduction to Metaphysics,
translated by Gregory Fried and Richard Polt (New Haven, 2000), 196-97—his
1924-25 lectures on Sophist are revealing; see Martin Heidegger, Plato’s Sophist,
translated by Richard Rojcewicz and André Schuwer (Bloomington, 1997);
Zuckert is particularly effective in distinguishing the Eleatic Stranger from
Socrates; see Plato’s Philosophers, 680-743 and 845-53.
54
In addition to Altman, “A Tale of Two Drinking Parties,” its sequel will
appear in Polis 28 (2011) as “Why Plato wrote Epinomis; Leonardo Tarán and the
Thirteenth Book of the Laws.” For Zuckert on Epinomis, see 137 n. 142 and 143
n. 149. See also Altman, German Stranger, 1-26 and 474-92.
55
For the crucial continuity between Timaeus and Philebus (in particular
Philebus 27b8), see Taylor, Commentary on Timaeus, 86 and Cherniss, “The
Relation of Timaeus to Plato’s Later Dialogues,” 236-41. As Ficino recognized,
the neglect of dia/krisij at 23d9-e1 is significant; see Michael J.B. Allen (ed.),
Marsilio Ficino: The Philebus Commentary (Berkeley, 1975), 420-2.
56
In addition to the metaphysical continuity between Timaeus and Philebus
(see previous note), Critias is the only dialogue that breaks off abruptly in mid-
sentence (cf. Phaedrus 241d4) while Philebus begins in the middle of an ongoing
discussion (Cratylus begins with the arrival of Socrates). The subject of Philebus
recalls Republic, more particularly, a discussion ostentatiously absent from the
latter; cf. Philebus 11b4-c1 and Republic VI 505b5-506b4.
57
See Phaedrus 242b8-243d5; cf. Zuckert, Plato’s Philosophers, 303-4.
58
In addition to the fact that the conversation takes place outside the walls of
Athens (Phaedrus 227a3), note the location of justice itself at 247d5-e4 and the
separation of philosopher and law-abiding king at 248d2-5; cf. Republic V
473c11-e2 and VI 511b7-8.
59
In addition to Cratylus 401e6-402b3 and 411c1-5, see David Sedley,
Plato’s Cratylus (Cambridge, 2003), 108-12.
60
Less obvious dyads include: Parmenides-Cratylus, Theaetetus-Euthyphro,
Ion-Menexenus, Symposium-Lysis, and Laches-Charmides. Although separated by
11 William Altman

seven, four, and one dialogue respectively, Protagoras-Symposium, Euthydemus-

Meno, Gorgias-Meno resemble dyads.
61
See William O’Neill, Proclus: Alcibiades I; A Translation and Commentary
(The Hague, 1965), 1-4; cf. Nicholas Denyer (ed.), Plato: Alcibiades (Cambridge,
2001). In addition to A.J. Festugière, “L’ordre de lecture des dialogues de Platon
aux Ve/VIe siècles.” Museum Helveticum 26 (1969), 281-296 and Jaap Mansfeld,
Prolegomena: Questions to be Settled Before the Study of an Author, or a Text
(Leiden, 1994), H. Gregory Snyder, Teachers and Texts in the Ancient World;
Philosophers, Jews and Christians (London, 2000), 97-9 is a particularly useful
discussion of ancient attempts to reconstruct the ROPD.
62
Cf. Alcibiades Major 111a1-3 and Protagoras 327e3-328a1; see also
Denyer, Plato, Alcibiades, 122, Zuckert, Plato’s Philosophers, 217-8 n. 5 and
Lampert, How Philosophy Became Socratic, 129 n. 149, 143-4.
63
For the pre-War setting of Protagoras, see Lampert, How Philosophy
Became Socratic, 141-3; I have argued for the anti-War implications of Republic
at “Plato the Teacher,” Section 4. Originating in Gilbert Ryle, Plato’s Progress
(Cambridge, 1966), 23-44, the intuition about “dramatic performance” (and other
useful insights about Protagoras) is most vividly expressed at W.K.C. Guthrie, A
History of Greek Philosophy IV (Cambridge, 1975), 235.
64
Cf. Protagoras 349a8-d8 and Laws XII 963c5-964a5.
65
Cf. Protagoras 349b1-6 and Epinomis 989a4-b4.
66
Note the perfectly general application of Republic VI 510b4-9.
67
Given the tripartite soul’s dependence on the principle of non-contradiction,
Republic IV 437a4-9 is highly significant in the context of VI 510c2-d2.
68
In addition to the assumption that there are four virtues (cf. Republic IV
427e10-11 and e1), the process of elimination instituted at IV 427e13-428a7 is
particularly objectionable. In addition to Gregory Vlastos, “Justice and Psychic
Harmony in the Republic,” Journal of Philosophy 66 (1969), 505-521 at 516, and
John Gould, The Development of Plato’s Ethics (Cambridge, 1955), 178-181,
consider Francis MacDonald Cornford, “Psychology and Social Structure in the
Republic of Plato,” Classical Quarterly 6 (1912), 246-65 at 265 and 248: “Every
reader of the Republic is startled by the assumption, explicitly laid down at p. 427
E that these four virtues—Wisdom, Courage, Temperance, and Justice—cover the
whole field of virtue, so that, if we can discover and identify the first three, we
may be sure that the one left over will be Justice…Plato gives no proof
whatsoever that this list of virtues is really exhaustive…”
69
Note in particular the proleptic anticipation of the Cave at Republic IV
432b2-433a6, in particular cf. 432 c7-8 with VII 515a7 (also 515b9 and c2), VII
515e6-7, and 516e4-5 (also 520c3). Also relevant is the methodological
connection between VI 510d1-3 and IV 432d7-433a3. Naturally this line of
inquiry is treated more fully in “Plato the Teacher.”
70
Prolegomena to this reading have been published as Altman, “Altruism and
the Art of Writing,” 89-92.
71
See Altman, “Altruism and the Art of Writing,” 97-98
12 The Reading Order of Plato’s Dialogues

72
In the context of its first word (Republic I 327a1), the dialogue’s most
important word is katabate/on (VII 521c1).
73
See Republic IV 433a8-b4, V 473c11-e2, and VII 520c1-521a2.
74
Cf. Republic II 361e3-362a3 and VII 517a4-6.
75
The result being Protagoras 361a5-c2.
76
Symposium 212a2-b4.
77
Diogenes Laertius 3.46.
78
Cf. Republic I 328a1-b3 and Laws VII 808d4-e7.
79
Cf. Alcibiades Major 106a4-8 and Alcibiades Minor 151a3-6.
80
Tears of laughter begin to flow at Hippias Major 288d1-5.
81
See the comments on Ryle at Gabriel Danzig, Apologizing for Socrates;
How Plato and Xenophon Created Our Socrates (Lanham, 2010), 9.
82
Cf. Amatores 132d1-2 and 139a6-7.
83
Cf. Hippias Major 286c5 and 304d3-4.
84
Cf. Hippias Minor 364c4-7 and 376b7.
85
See Apology 28b9-d5 (cf. Apology 41b8-c2 and Symposium 179e1-180a4)
and Crito 44b1-2. Seth Bernadete, The Bow and the Lyre: A Platonic Reading of
the Odyssey (Lanham, 1997), 2 (“Achilles would have accepted Calypso’s offer”)
depends on an Odyssean understanding of both Achilles—cf. Republic VII
516d4-7 and X 620c6-7—and Plato; for the latter, see the last sentence of
Lampert, How Philosophy Became Socratic, 427 (see also 23 and 277).
86
Beginning at Protagoras 352b1-2; see Roslyn Weiss, The Socratic Paradox
and Its Enemies (Chicago, 2006), 47-68.
87
Cf. Lesser Hippias 363a6-b1 and Ion 530b9-10.
88
Cf. Ion 540d4 and Menexenus 235b8-c5.
89
See Ion 534c1, 535a4, 536c2, 536d3, and 542a4, Theages 128d2-3, and
Meno 99e6, 100b2-3; cf. Alcibiades Major 135d6.
90
Ion 533c9-535a5.
91
See Altman, “Altruism and the Art,” 95-6.
92
Cf. Menexenus 245c2-6 and Xenophon, Hellenica 5.1.31 and cf. Menexenus
242e6-243a3 and Thucydides 6.6.1, 6.8.2, 6.18.1-2, and 6.77. See also Altman,
“Reading Order of Plato’s Dialogues,” Section 4 and Christopher Bruell, On the
Socratic Education: An Introduction to the Shorter Dialogues of Plato (Lanham,
1999), 201-9.
93
Symposium 223d3-6; the party takes place on the eve of the Sicilian
Expedition and Socrates is pondering the implications of his being at Potidaea at
220c3-5. In addition to my “Reading Order” (see previous note), consider Charles
Salman, “Anthropogony and Theogony in Plato’s Symposium.” Classical Journal
86 (1991), 214-225.
94
The four virtue dialogues—Laches (courage), Charmides (temperance),
Gorgias (justice), and Theages (wisdom)—are placed between Euthydemus and
Meno.
95
Euthydemus 271a1. Note that Lysis is the last dialogue in Thrasyllus’ Fifth
Tetralogy, Euthydemus the first in his Sixth; he seems to have resorted to the
13 William Altman

crude expedient of dialogue-length (cf. Bruell, On the Socratic Education) in

constructing these two tetralogies. In addition to setting, the presence of Ctesippus
in both dialogues is important; cf. Lysis 203a4 and Euthydemus 273a7-b1. The
shortcomings of arranging Plato’s dialogues according to dramatic dates alone are
suggested by the fact that Menexenus is older in Menexenus than he is in Lysis;
for the thematic connections between Menexenus, Symposium, and Lysis, see
Andrea Wilson Nightingale, “The Folly of Praise: Plato’s Critique of Encomiastic
Discourse in the Lysis and Symposium,” Classical Quarterly n.s. 43 (1991), 112-
130.
96
Cf. Euthydemus 271d3 and Laches 178a1.
97
See Altman, “Laches Before Charmides”; cf. Rosamond Kent Sprague,
Plato: Laches and Charmides; Translated with an Introduction and Notes
(Indianapolis, 1973), vii: “I have placed Laches first as being simpler than the
Charmides and as providing a more leisurely introduction to the Socratic
method.”
98
I agree with the ingenious suggestion at Lampert, How Philosophy Became
Socratic, 235-6 that Socrates’ unnamed auditor in Charmides is Plato, interested
in his famous relatives (154).
99
See Dodds, Plato’s Gorgias, 12-14 and John Bremer, Plato and the
Founding of the Academy (Lanham, 2002), 100-1.
100
Note that the “what is rhetoric?” question is first posed by Polus, not
Socrates at Gorgias 462b10; as an ei1dwlon of justice (cf. 465c1-3 and 463d1-2),
rhetoric cannot be understood except in relation to it (460a5-7).
101
See George Klosko, “The Insufficiency of Reason in Plato’s Gorgias,”
Western Political Quarterly 36 (1983), 579-595 at 593 and James A. Arieti,
Interpreting Plato: The Dialogues as Drama (Lanham, 1991), 92.
102
Cf. Gorgias 469b12 and 473a5; see “The Reading Order of Plato’s
Dialogues,” Section 2.
103
Cf. Republic 520e1 and J.D. Mabbott, “Is Plato’s Republic Utilitarian?”
Mind n.s. 46 (1937), 468-474 at 474: “Why do the philosophers leave their
thinking and descend into the cave? Because some one must rule the city. But
why should they do it and no one else? Because only so will the city be well
ruled. But why should such considerations weigh with them when they are so
happy in the outer world? Because they are just men. δίκαια δικαίοις
ἐπιτάξομεν.” This passage was deleted from the reprinted version in Gregory
Vlastos (ed.), 1971. Plato. Volume 2. (New York, 1971), 57-65. Cicero can be
identified as Plato’s best student because he repeatedly returned to “the sewer of
Romulus” (Letters to Atticus 2.1.8) and gave his life to the cause of preventing the
Republic from giving way to tyranny; for democracy as “the age of heroes,” see
Strauss, City and Man, 130-3.
104
For corruption of the youth, see Theages122a5 and 127c2; for “new gods,”
see 128d2-3. Gorgias (464d5-6 and 521e3-4), Theages, and Meno (94e3-95a1) all
foreshadow the trial while the critique presented in Cleitophon makes Republic
Socrates’ first Apology.
14 The Reading Order of Plato’s Dialogues

105
Theages 130e5-6; cf. Alcibiades Major 135d6 and Theaetetus 150c7-e1.
106
Cf. Theages 125e8-126a4 and Gorgias 527e5-6.
107
Cleitophon 408d1-e2.
108
Phaedo 118a7-8; cf. Glenn Most, “A Cock for Asclepius,” Classical
Quarterly, 43 n.s. (1993), 96-111 and Nietzsche, Götzen-Dämmerung, “Problem
of Socrates,” §1.
109
Protagoras 310a8. I am grateful to Maicon Engler for pointing out this
important connection between Phaedo and Protagoras.
110
For a wonderful exposition of the correct approach to this important
pedagogical task, see Roslyn Weiss, “The Hedonic Calculus in the Protagoras
and the Phaedo,” Journal of the History of Philosophy 27 (1989), 511-529; the
“golden sentences” at 524 and 526n27 deserve particular consideration. I am very
grateful to Weiss for her support and encouragement.