On Manly Courage: A Study of Plato's Laches

By Walter T. Schmid

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.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0809317451
• ISBN13: 9780809317455
• Release Date: July 1992
• Publisher: Southern Illinois University Press
• Length: 248 Pages
• Weight: 1.33 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.0" x 6.3" x 9.6"