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Kevin Corrigan, A Less Familiar Plato: From Phaedo to Philebus, Cambridge University Press, 2023, 339pp., $110.00 (hbk), ISBN 9781009324854.
Reviewed by Brianna Zgurich, Northern Arizona University
Kevin Corrigan’s book, A Less Familiar Plato, presents a more nuanced view in lieu of what he identifies as the “stereotypical essentialist”, “mind-over-matter”, “authoritarian” Plato common in scholarship. Corrigan impressively focuses on the inherent direct and indirect interconnections between the Phaedo, Republic, Symposium, Phaedrus, and Philebus. Throughout the book, the arguments are complex, multifaceted, and unified, dealing with language, ontology, epistemology, and ethics, all in service of one major point: Plato has an important philosophical place for “bodily experience” in his epistemology and ethics. Specialists and instructors of ancient philosophy will be delighted by Corrigan’s original take on well-discussed arguments and prominent passages in Plato.
Chapter 1 argues for a reading of the Phaedo contrary to the popular take of scholars like Ian Crombie and…
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