Why Is the Gorgias so Bitter?

Abstract

Commentators have often responded with uneasiness to Plato's Gorgias. E. R. Dodds speaks of the disillusioned of the criticisms lev- eled against Athenian politics and politicians and of the tragic tone of the dialogue's last part, which culminates in a prediction of Socrates' condem- nation (1959, 19). F. M. Cornford observes that the discussion between Socrates and Callicles marked by a bitterness of tone rarely found else- where in the dialogues (1945, 21). A. E. Taylor is more explicitly irri- tated: Personally—he writes—I cannot help feeling that, with all its moral splendor, the dialogue is too long: it 'drags.' The of the Protagoras or Republic, as I feel, would have known how to secure the same effect with less expenditure of words; there is a diffuseness about our dialogue which betrays the hand of a prentice, though the prentice in this case is Plato (1960, 103). Many readers of the Gorgias have a similar emotional response, yet the feeling that this is a bitter dialogue is never analyzed, accounted for, or adequately justified. While assessing various hypotheses on the date of composition of the Gorgias, Dodds speculates that its disillusioned may suggest that wrote the dialogue right after Socrates' death and under the im- pact of the event. The Gorgias is so bitter, the reasoning goes, because was enraged with the Athenians when he wrote it. Dodds goes on to discard the hypothesis of such an early date of composition, but he does not revise his view that this is indeed a bitter dialogue. Why, then, does the