Only in the Contemplation of Beauty Is Human Life Worth Living

In this lecture, Alexander Nehamas examines Socrates' speech in praise of erōs in the Symposium (201d–212c), which is perhaps one of the most influential passages Plato ever composed. Nehamas returns to this passage, not with a desire to offer yet another interpretation of what Plato really meant to say about the relationship between erōs and its inherent attraction to kalon (which he translates as ‘beauty’).

Instead, Nehamas examines how much of what Plato says can be read not just as an inspired (and inspiring) flight of the imagination but also as something we can actually believe—a solid, knowing, and accurate description of the phenomenology of love and beauty.