A Hybrid Techn of the Soul?

: Thoughts on the Relation between Philosophy and Rhetoric in

Gorgias and Phaedrus
Author(s): Ramsey Eric Ramsey
Reviewed work(s):
Source: Rhetoric Review, Vol. 17, No. 2 (Spring, 1999), pp. 247-262
Published by: Taylor & Francis, Ltd.
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/466154 .
Accessed: 05/01/2012 11:43
Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at .
http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp
JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of
content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms
of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.

Taylor & Francis, Ltd. is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Rhetoric Review.

http://www.jstor.org

RAMSEY ERIC RAMSEY

Arizona State UniversityWest

A Hybrid Techne of the Soul?:

Thoughts on the Relation between
Philosophy and Rhetoric in Gorgias and Phaedrus

Introduction and Some Caveats

WhetherPlato coined the word rhetoric, what is striking is that he was the
first to attemptto make it disappear.'My argumentmay well add some strength
to Schiappa's contention that Plato may have coined the word rhetoric by
suggesting that to make somethingdisappear,one would need to be dealing with
something like a well-defined object (though entering directly into the heart of
these often heated debates is not the focus of this essay) ("Did Plato Coin the
Word Rhetorike?";"Neo-Sophistic Rhetorical Criticism"). If Plato desires to
make rhetoric disappear,as I shall argue he did at least in the Gorgias, then it
behooves him to have a well-articulatedtarget of concern. If it is the case that
naming a set of practices helps to constitutethose practices as an object domain,
then it makes sense to suggest that Plato has cause to name a set of practices
"rhetoric"so as to be able to deal with them.
A strain of Western thinking has long lamented the presence of rhetoric,
from the position Descartes takes in the Meditationsto the rise of positivism and
on now to the crass materialismof sociobiology. Yet this legacy, often blamed
on Plato, may be if not a false then at least a not wholly accurateaccusation.If
the reading below is persuasive, then we should see that what we are
customarily asked to accept as Plato's wholesale disdain for rhetoric, while
perhapsat the heart of the Gorgias, is not so clearly dismissive by the time we
get to the Phaedrus. We have contemporarylessons yet to learn from Plato and
from recognizing that the history of philosophy and the history of rhetoricneed
always to be taken together. It is this lesson and not simply the pervasive
accusationsthat I am willing, in part, to attributeto the legacy of Plato by way
of the knowing misreadingof Phaedrus I offer below.
This essay argues that Plato does well in the Gorgias to perform a
philosophical slight-of-hand that renders rhetoric, if not invisible, at least
redundant.The argument suggests that after the series of exchanges in the

RhetoricReview, Vol. 17, No. 2, Spring 1999

247

248

RhetoricReview

Gorgias with Gorgias, Polus, and Callicles, Plato finds (strangelyperhapsgiven

the thesis that he coined the word) that the set of practices named"rhetoric"by
his interlocutorswas not worthy of a name at all. This is the case when rhetoric,
as Kahn suggests, is taken as an art associated with the "noble"endeavor to
influence the humansoul (psvche).
However, the saga does not end with the conclusions of the Gorgias. While
I shall argue that Plato made rhetoricdisappearin the Gorgias at least from the
list of arts, it does not remain out of sight. Universally held to postdate the
Gorgias, the Phaedrus has rhetoricas its centerpieceand rhetoricis theretreated
not as the object with which one must do away, rather Plato treats it as
something with which-perhaps against his wishes-he must deal. When one
reads the Phaedrus, one cannot help but get the feeling that Plato is not pleased
by having to readmit rhetoric to the discussion. Nonetheless, in this dialogue
rhetoric comes to have an inevitable and necessary place alongside (or perhaps
even closer) the highest of Platonic arts, viz., philosophy.
This hermeneuticforay into two of Plato's dialogues begins with the belief,
held by many, that we can trace a change in Plato's thinkingin them as concerns
the relation between philosophy and rhetoric. While it is the case that this
change in Plato's position is noted by a number of his readers,it nonetheless
remainsthat why and what comes of this often-recognizedchangehas not always
been fully explicated. From what I see as the attempt in the Gorgias to make
rhetoric disappearto the recognition in the Phaedrus that philosophy without
rhetoric's voice leaves the truth mute needs furtherinvestigation.It remains to
ask how both serve to further this argument and also to clarify its power to
persuade in an age that has, by and large, forgotten Plato. As a way to begin
these investigations, I plan to read or more aptly, misread, the myth of the
charioteerfrom the heartof the Phaedrus. Perhapsless than a readingor even a
misreading, the following is a creative attempt to retell the story in a
contemporaryidiom, inspiredall the while by Plato's beginning.
It is always difficult to approach philosophy and rhetoric in Plato's
dialogues Gorgias and Phaedrus. On the one hand, the popularphilosophical
conception is that Plato simply had a passing critique of rhetoricbut that these
dialogues are really about ethics and love, respectively, and that the discussion
of rhetoric is only what the dialogues are "ostensibly"about (Levi). But this is
just a certain philosophic arrogance and misses what twentieth-century
continental philosophy takes seriously, that is, the intimate relation between
philosophy and rhetoric(Johnstone;Schrag).
JacquesDerrida,for example, cautions us against a too-facile acceptanceof
a complete collapse of the concepts rhetoric and philosophy. Derridais asked if
its is not the case that "ever since Plato's opposition to rhetoricas a discipline,

A HybridTechne of the SoulI

249

philosophy and rhetoric seem to have existed in a state of continual tension.

Why does there seem to be tension between these disciplines? Aren't these
disciplines-rhetoric and philosophy-necessarily bound together?Aren't they
necessarily intricatelyand completely tied?" (Olson 16-17). In response Derrida
says:
Well, from that point of view I would be on the side of philosophy.
The tension comes first from the fact that rhetoric as a separate
discipline, as a technique or as an autonomous field, may become a
sort of empty instrumentwhose usefulness or effectiveness would be
independentof logic, or even reference or truth-an instrumentin
the hands of the sophists in the sense that Plato wanted to define
them. So contraryto what some people think I think-for instance,
Habermas-I would be on the side of philosophy, logic, truth,
reference, etc. When I question philosophy and the philosophical
projectas such, it's not in the name of sophistics, of rhetoricas just a
playful technique.I'm interestedin the rhetorichidden in philosophy
itself because within, let's say, the typical Platonicdiscoursethere is
a rhetoric-a rhetoricagainstrhetoric,against sophists. (17)
If we know how to listen, then Plato has some more to teach us on this score as
we questionrhetoric,philosophy, and theirrelations (see also Derrida).
On the other hand, rhetoriciansoften attack the two dialogues without a
recognitionof the broadphilosophical issues involved in Plato's metaphysics,or
they treat his metaphysics as an indefensible position that is dismissed easily
from a postmetaphysicalstandpoint.Sharing results with a certain philosophic
arrogance,this latter strategy of bold dismissal (shared also by any number of
so-called postmodernpositions) leaves much of importanceuncovered in these
two dialogues.
I am interested in attempting to reinspire Plato's two dialogues from my
metaphoricalframe of Plato-as-magician (cf. de Romilly) who tries to make
rhetoricdisappearin the Gorgias and as the resigned but powerful myth-maker
in the Phaedrus in which he tells of the dangers of rhetoric,knowing now that it
is something with which we cannot do away (see Curran).Moreover, if I am
persuasive,we shall see, when we get to the Phaedrus, that we no longer would
wish for rhetoricto be gone and that the dangers of its disappearanceoutweigh
the dangers of its presence. Indeed, rhetoric becomes in Plato's Phaedrus
philosophy's necessary Other.
Following Schiappa ("Neo-Sophistic Rhetorical Criticism") I shall only
claim for the unique interpretationof Phaedrus I offer at the end of the essay

250

RhetoricReview

that it offers a sense of organic shape that may be outside the analytic of facts
proper,but well within what truths we have left to learn from Plato concerning
the relationbetween philosophy and rhetoric.
Plato's Sleight of Hand: Philosophy and Rhetoric in Gorgias
My Plato-as-magicianreading of Gorgias relies, no doubt, on what one
might call a rather straightforwardreading of the text. Enos (Greek Rhetoric
before Aristotle) and Benardete, for example, render different, nuanced, but
equally compelling reads of the text as they pursuetheir particularends. For my
part in the matter,I shall settle for the rather straightforwardreading caste in
terms of rhetoric's disappearanceto make room for the unique misreading I
propose for Phaedrus.
Plato opens the Gorgias with Socrates arrivingtoo late to have heard the
demonstrationperformedby the famous rhetor whose name gives the dialogue
its title. In concluding that demonstration,Gorgias had agreed to answer any
question put to him. Socrates is invited to join in the festivities by asking
Gorgias questionsthatget at the heartof Socrates' concerns.As Robinson points
out, Socrates often asks questions that take one of two forms. Either he asks
"what is X?" or he asks "is X Y?" In this case we see that he is asking the later
question as he is attemptingto ascertainwhetherrhetoricis an art (techne).
Socrates uses the analogy of the techne of medicine to show how rhetoric
fails to be analogous to this art. What is key in this analogy is that Socrates
believes that medicine is the most noble techne with concern for the body,
whereas in this dialogue the question being investigated is what is in fact
rhetoric's concern. For Socrates to proceed, he needs a firm answer to this
question so that one can know if rhetoric has an analogous knowledge of its
object as medicinedoes vis-a-vis the body.
Socrates determinesthe object of rhetoric based on the way he draws out
the implications of the responses he receives early in the dialogue. Rhetoric is
claimed by its defenders in the Gorgias to be concerned with winning the
conviction of one's hearers (Gorgias 454b ff). Now this telos of rhetoric is
ultimately concerned with the humanpsvche because any conviction one holds
or can come to hold, for Plato, is held in/by one's soul. Thus he claims that if the
set of practices now called "rhetoric"are going to be given the designation
techne, then they must show, as medicine does with its knowledge of the body,
its knowledge of the object of its ultimateconcern viz., the soul. Througha now
famous series of questions and interrogations,Socrates reveals that each of the
interlocutor'sclaims concerningthe benefit of rhetoricfail to demonstratesuch

A HybridTechne of the Soul?

251

a knowledge. Each in his turn fails on Plato's account to give adequate

justificationfor rhetoric'sconcern for the Good of theirhearers'souls.
This position and judgmentis, of course, generatedin light of Plato's larger
metaphysicalproject (Moline). Clearly, it may be an open question as to when
exactly we get Plato's metaphysicalsystem in his writtenwork, that is, when in
the difficult-to-determinechronologyof Plato's work do we get his theory of the
Forms. One thing, however, seems clear in this respect: Something intimately
connected with Plato's metaphysicsis at work in his critiqueof rhetoric.
His attackon rhetoricis in every case buttressedby the distinctionbetween
opinion, of which he charges rhetoric having as its ultimate concern, and
knowledge, which one must have if he or she is going to do justice to the soul.
The notions of the Good, the true, and the just, as well as the relationof these to
opinions and knowledge, give coherence to Plato's critique of rhetoric in the
Gorgias. Without some sense of the abiding truth of the Forms, one has little
foundation from which to make sense of the sustained critique of rhetoric that
Plato gives us in this dialogue.
Dramatically,Socrates is not the only one asking questions here. His first
sustainedcritique of rhetoriccomes in answer to a question put directly to him,
by Polus: What does he thinks rhetoricis? In essence, Polus is asking Socrates a
very Socratic question in the form of the other of the two famous questions
Socrates is fond of asking. Socrates has an answer ready for Polus and it is that
rhetoric is no techne at all; rhetoric is he claims nothing more than a knack
(tribe). This knack is, like all such practices, concerned with pleasure as an end
distinct from the Good. It is here that a returnto the earlier-discussedanalogy
with medicine is crucial. Comparingrhetoricas a knack to cooking, the analogy
from medicine again is the basis for his argument against rhetoric. As the
interlocutorshave set things up, by asserting that rhetoric is concerned with
producingconviction in others and thus in the end concerned with the soul, the
argumentis suggested by rhetoric'sdefendersthat rhetoricdoes for the health of
the soul what medicine does for the health of the body. But Socrates thinks he
has shown that rhetoric is not concerned with the Good of the soul but rather
with pleasure.
It remains importantthroughoutthat none of Socrates' interlocutorsobject
to the analogy. As Plato presentsthem, they seem to thinkthat medicine is a fine
example of the art of caring for the body. The point of contentionis, as we have
seen, whether rhetoric is medicine's counterpart for the soul. Indeed, can
rhetoric occupy the place of medicine in the analogy? Socrates argues that
rhetoricis no art (techne) at all, but a knack, and like cooking is to medicine, so
rhetoric is to that techne which is truly concerned with knowledge of the soul.
Consequently, Socrates sets up the following set of relations: Cooking is the

252

RhetoricReview

knack and medicine the art concerned with the body, just as rhetoricis the knack
and some as yet unstatedX is the techne of the soul.
It is at this point that we must addressthe major questions that arise in this
light but have as yet been unanswered. Perhaps it might put like this: If not
rhetoric,then what?or more directly:What is the art of the human soul? Before
we address these critical and fundamentalquestions, we must first remember
that many philosophersread these concerns with rhetoricas somethingof a ruse.
It is suggested or ratheroften assertedthat these dramaticmoves simply exist to
allow Plato to get at the real issues of arguing against hedonism (contra
Callicles) and against tyranny and dictatorship(contra Polus and as he does in
the Republic). However, this misses what I take to be at least one of the major
points of the focus here, and that is the relation between rhetoric and the soul.
Plato cannot help but deal with questions of the soul when he deals with
questions of rhetoric.Furthermore,if this is the case, then he must when dealing
with the soul also deal with the Good, the true, and the just. This, of course,
demands reference to his larger philosophic commitments. Thus discussions of
rhetoriclead necessarily and ultimatelyto discussions of morality, which in turn
are groundedin Plato's other philosophicalclaims. Plato relies on philosophical
claims that he develops elsewhere in his corpus to build a case againstrhetoric.
In the Gorgias these positions, even if unstated,are not unutilized.
On this reading, the issues of justice, tyranny,and hedonism arise because
of claims on behalf of rhetoric to be concerned with the human soul. Rhetoric
and the claims made in its name are not ancillaryto the dialogue, but form a part
of its center. As McComiskey argues generally and Enos argues specifically
with referenceto Callicles, the practices that Plato may have just named in this
dialogue for the first time are at that historical moment making great and, to
Plato's mind detrimental,"democratic"and "pragmatic"changes in Athenian
culture. Rhetoricis no passing interest or ruse on Plato's part; no, he is indeed
frightenedof rhetoricand it political as well as ethical consequences-so much
so thathe tries in this dialogue to make rhetoricdisappear,feeling perhapsthat if
he could put it out of sight he could be at peace. How, then, does Plato attempt
this sleight-of-hand? By establishing, to his own satisfaction at least, that
rhetoricis not an art but rathera knack and thus concerned with pleasure as an
end in itself; therefore the question of what is the techne of the good of the
humansoul still stands.
What is the propertechne to deal with the humansoul? Again we can put it
this way: Based on the analogy that Socrates has utilized throughout,medicine
is the techne of the body and cooking is the knack, rhetoric is the knack of the
soul and somethingX is the techne. What Plato believes himself to have proven
in the Gorgias is that one and only one techne merits such a name vis-a-vis the

A HybridTechne of the Soul?

253

soul and that is, of course, philosophy. Only philosophy (here we are forced to
think of Book VII of the Republic, 537a-41e) can fulfill the knowledge
requirementsto deal with the soul. Plato makes it clear in this dialogue that
rhetoricis redundantbecause he shows that it seeks to rename philosophy. Yet
the name change is dangerous because the justice deserving of the soul that is
determinedfor Plato by philosophy cannot afford the influences of rhetoric,an
influence that rhetoricclaims for itself. Rhetoric's influence is unjust because,
Plato argues, it appeals only to "flattery"and thus places pleasure and success
before truthandjustice.
On Plato's account,there alreadyexists a techne for dealing with the affairs
of convincing others in the polis. Furthermore,it already has a name. Even if
Plato coined the word rhetorike, it turns out to be only for the purpose of
showing that the practices this word names have no place in the life of a polis
seeking to be moral and just. Rhetoric (rhetorike) may appearin this dialogue
for the first time, but only to disappearbecause Plato shows that on his account
it renames a practice that is truly concerned with the soul. According to the
argumentsPlato makes in the Gorgias, rhetoricought to disappearbecause it is
redundantwith respect to the just dealings with the soul. It is importantto keep
in mind that the charge is not that rhetoric does not affect the soul: In fact, it
does on Plato's account,and this is indeed why it is so frighteningto him. Were
it not the case that rhetoric has an effect on the soul, then it could be safely
ignoredand left alone. However, the claim is not that rhetoricdoes not affect the
soul; ratherthe problem is that it does not do this well. Rhetoric does have an
effect on the soul, but it is base and at odds with Plato's desire that such souleffects be noble.
Plato ends Gorgias with Socrates recounting a myth of the afterliferecountingwhat Socrates has heard happens to the soul after the demise of the
body. Here my frameof Plato-as-magicianwho seeks to make rhetoricdisappear
allows us to see the myth not only as the basis for Plato's argumentsabout the
moral mannerof living in the becoming of this world (not unlike argumentsat
the end of Republic). Beyond this we can see the myth as also a direct assault on
rhetoric.The myth makes much of the soul's nakedness,that is, strippedof any
of its worldly embellishments. On Plato's account, it seems, when all
distractionsprovided by rhetoric are removed (honors, clothes that symbolize
status, etc.), then one cannot hide, divert, or pull any slights-of-handto protect
one's soul. The myth recounts the story of what happens after rhetoric has
disappearedfor (the) good. If Plato fears he has not made rhetoric disappear
from this world, then he seems to hold out a hope that rhetoric will surely
disappearin the other world. However, it is only a hope-because his hope is
based on a story Plato cannot confirm; it is a story he has only heard.

254

RhetoricReview

It is clearly the case that Plato accepts the challenge of the rhetoric, what
Nietzsche calls the contest. No doubt, too, this contest is not, as Enos points out,
one in which the rhetorsspeak for themselves (Greek Rhetoric beforeAristotle).
That is to say, Gorgias is Plato's artful creation, his magic show in which the
rhetors are merely props or characters/caricatures.However much this fact
concerning the dialogue calls certain aspects of Plato's text into question-and
indeed it does raise suspicions-Nietzsche's insight seems to save other aspects
of the text when he argues:
What, for example, is of special artistic significance in Plato's
dialogues is for the most part the result of a contest with the art of
the orators,the sophists, and the dramatistsof his time, invented for
the purpose of enabling him to say in the end: "Look, I too can do
what my great rivals can do; indeed, I can do it better than they. No
Protagorashas invented myths as beautiful as mine; no dramatist
such a vivid and captivating whole as my Symposion;no oratorhas
written orations like those in my Gorgias-and now I repudiateall
this entirely and condemn all imitate art. Only the contest made me a
poet, a sophist, and an orator."What a problem opens up before us
when we inquire into the relationship of the contest to the
conception of the work of art! (37-38)
With this reading of Plato-as-magicianin hand, we are now ready to move to
Phaedrus because the contest, even if not the magic, continues there.
Why Did Rhetoric Not Stay Away?: Philosophy and Rhetoric in Phaedrus
Plato attemptsto make rhetoricdisappearin the Gorgias by arguingthat it
is an unnecessary and unworthy synonym for philosophy. While perhaps
convincing in the artfulcontext of that dialogue, Plato is not a powerful enough
magician it would seem to keep rhetoricfrom reappearing.
But the Phaedrus is of interest because of other qualities. Indeed, as
Schiappa(Protagoras and Logos; "Isocrates'Philosophia") argues with respect
to Gorgias and Howland with respect to the Phaedrus, Plato has a specific target
in mind in his attacks on rhetoric. Both authors suggest that this target is
Isocrates, one of the main reasons being that this teacher and contemporaryof
Plato was using the word philosophy to describe his teachings and practice.As
Schiappaargues, this use of philosophy will not do for Plato. As a consequence,
Schiappa argues, "[i]f Plato could identify the 'product' of his rival Isocrates'

A HybridTechne of the Soul?

255

trainingas something unnecessaryor undesirable,so much the betterfor Plato's

school" (Protagoras and Logos 45).
My readingis also supportedby Howland's essay "The Attack on Isocrates
in Phaedrus."Howland argues that we understandthe critiquein the Phaedrus,
such as it is, as an attacknot only on rhetoricin general but as also on Isocrates
in particular. With Howland-as with Schiappa above-if we follow this
reading,then philosophy is at stake in these debates about rhetoricand who and
what practices will have the proper claim to the name "philosophy"is a central
and drivingforce of these dialogues.
Plato seems to have failed to make rhetoricdisappearfor good and to have
won for himself the sole right to the name "philosophy"in the Gorgias. I shall
arguethat he attemptsto capturethis concept in the myth of the charioteerin the
Phaedrus and again attemptsto ease his fear of rhetoricand to claim possession
of the name "philosophy."
Interestingly, here in the Phaedrus, Plato treats his object of fear much
differently. He does not, we may begin by saying, attemptany more magic of
the sort practicedin the Gorgias. However, he is up to something. Given what
we have just seen in the Gorgias, we may well be surprisedby what he is up to
in this work. We cannot help but wonder:What happenedto Plato between the
Gorgias and the Phaedrus? While we may never know exactly what answer to
give to that question, we feel quite certainafter going throughthe Phaedrus that
we could with great confidence answer:"somethingprofound."It is the case, no
doubt, that Plato speaks of rhetoric in other dialogues that may well have been
writtenin the time between the two works in question here. Nonetheless, these
instances do not exhibit what we would call an epiphany-they do not mark an
announcedand conspicuous change of hearton Plato's account.
Phaedrus begins with Socrates again confrontingrhetoric,and, initially, he
does not seem to be any more pleased with the practicesthat have come to bear
that name; as we know, however, this will change in the course of the dialogue.
If, as we did with the Gorgias, we see this dialogue as having rhetoricas a part
of its center, then we get a reading of Plato that highlights his articulationof the
relationbetween philosophy and rhetoric.
Of course this dialogue is about love and the soul, or it is said to be at its
best when it is about love and the soul; but this does not prohibitits being about
rhetoricas well. Furthermore,it may be about love because it is about rhetoric
suggesting the same causal relation to which I appealedin my Plato-as-magician
reading of the Gorgias. Love, of course, becomes the theme of the dialogue
between Phaedrusand Socrates dramaticallybecause it is the theme of Lysias's
speech that the young Phaedrushas in his possession (with which, it has always
been my suspicion, he is on his way to use at the gym). The questionwhy love is

256

RhetoricReview

related to the rhetorical theme of the dialogue may not be quite so easy to
recognize. Love (eros) is not unrelatedto the new view Plato has on rhetoricthat
he develops in this dialogue. Love is concerned with the soul and thus is now
linked to rhetoricin ways that seem to have been forbiddenin the Gorgias. To
keep from getting ahead of ourselves, let us move to very near the end of the
dialogue.
From a certainhermeneuticposition, the whole of the Phaedrus can be read
as Plato's dealing with the ramificationsof the relationbetween philosophy and
rhetoric.This is in starkcontrastto the nonrelationand ultimate incompatibility
between the two for which Plato arguedin the Gorgias. Without a doubt, Plato
does not have any more respect here for rhetoricper se nor does his fear subside
in toto. The dangersof rhetoricwhen practicedas a knack still haunthim. Yet in
this work, Plato leaves open the positive possibilities of rhetoric. Can it be that,
after all, rhetoriccan be a teche^?Yes and, of course, no.
A new relation, Plato's coming to terms with the necessity of rhetoric,
manifests itself in the Phaedrus. As we know, rhetoric gets a better hearing in
this work. The voice of rhetoricthis time is not representedby others (or was it
always misrepresentedbefore? Certainlythese are real suspicions (Enos, Greek
Rhetoric before Aristotle), but speaks (almost) for itself. At 260d she speaks, in
a sense at least. Socrates says that perhapsshe has been treatedtoo roughly (we
cannot help but wonder if this refers not only to the passages immediately
preceding this one but in the whole of the Gorgias as well) and imagines that
she might indeed say: "Whatnonsense is this, my good sirs? I do not insist on
ignorance of truth as an essential qualification for the would-be speaker; for
what my advice is worth I suggest that he should acquirethat knowledge before
embarkingon me. I do emphaticallyassert, however, that without my assistance
the man who knows the truthwill make no progressin the artof persuasion."
Here rhetoric makes the case that without her the truth would in fact be
mute. Plato-and I sense he is reluctant-comes to see in this work that rhetoric
will not accept being ignored and that it certainly will not again disappear
(indeed it never had). Plato has to find a way to deal with the ubiquity and
constant presence of rhetoric,the object of his fear that now is face to face with
his metaphysical positions, brought there by we still wonder what. The
consequences are greaterthan I have made them seem because the mute truthis
no truthat all for Plato.
Plato suggests that philosophy is a worthlesstechne without rhetoric,and he
puts these words into the mouth of rhetoricherself and she is left to be the first
to say this-as if Plato is unable to bring himself to say this directly. We must
wonder what it even means to have a worthless techne and if it is even possible
we get the feeling that a worthless techne is equivalentto not having a techne^at

A HybridTechne of the Soul?

257

all. Why would Plato make such concessions to his enemy? I am submittingthat
such concessions are made so thatphilosophy can say something.The voice that
philosophylacks, it gets from rhetoric.Plato is forced to make a place for-even
if not a peace with-rhetoric. Moreover, this place is next to philosophy, the
very techne that once was purified from any infection by rhetoric. Next to
rhetoric-is this even too far away? Better to say entwinedwith rhetoric,not one
without the other. Read this way, Plato comes to hold what looks to be a
precursorto contemporaryposition on the relation of rhetoricand philosophy.
In Phaedrus Plato comes to recognize this fact of the interdependenceof
rhetoricand philosophy. Unmistakably,Plato will not have this relation forget
its obligations to philosophy. The change marked in his thinking does not
change the fact that this is still his majorconcern. Thatis to say, if philosophy is
mute without rhetoric, it is still the case that, and here akin to the arguments
from the Gorgias, rhetoric without philosophy is a real danger to justice. For
Plato, this point is not to be lost on the young Phaedrus.If Plato is going to
make concessions to rhetoric,he is not willing, therefore,to give up everything.
Socratescalls on the phantomargumentsassociated with the voice of rhetoricto
persuade Phaedrus of the necessity of this relation: "Come forward, noble
creatures,and persuade Phaedrus,who begets such lovely children, that unless
he becomes an adequatephilosopherhe will never be an adequatespeakereither
on any subject"(261a).
Socrates ends an argumentat 269b saying that practitionersof rhetoricare
"unableto define the natureof rhetoric, and have believed in consequence that
they have discovered the art itself, when all that they have got hold of is the
knowledge which is a necessary preliminaryto it. They think that by imparting
this knowledge they have perfectly discharged the task of a teacher of rhetoric,
and that the use of each of these devices so as to produce conviction and the
composition of a consistent whole is a simple matter which their pupils must
work out for themselves when they come to make speeches." The charge that
rhetoricby itself is only half a techne seems on first sight to be only anotherslur
againstrhetoric.Undoubtedlythough, the other side must also hold, namely that
philosophy as a mute enterpriseis only half a techne at best without rhetoric.
Admitting to the former to damn rhetoric also casts its aspersions on a
philosophythathas no voice. Plato recognizes that he cannotdo withoutrhetoric
any more thanrhetoriccan do withoutphilosophy.
To this point this seems to be the case: Plato recognized that his
metaphysics and his concerns for justice mean little in the silence of a world
without discourse, regardless of how many dangers rhetoric might raise in its
wake. The silence that would be self-imposed by continuing his assault on
rhetoric would be the certain failure of metaphysics, of justice, and the Good.

258

RhetoricReviewi

Plato must give up the better part of what Derrida calls above Plato's "rhetoric
againstrhetoric."It has come to this: Plato realizes that he must risk the dangers
of rhetoricfor the sake of philosophy.
In the Gorgias there was one technte-philosophy-that cared for the soul
and a knack that was unjust in its attempts to usurp philosophy's rightful
place-rhetoric. I contend that in the Phaedrus there is again one techne, but
now it is a hybrid;both rhetoricand philosophytogether are needed for the care
of the soul. So were we wrong to characterizePlato as a magician who made
things disappear?Does it turn out that Plato is more akin to the famous magic
acts that saw things in half and in the finale put them back together again? It
seems this image might bettercapturethe relation of philosophy and rhetoricas
it is treated in the two dialogues and that the grand finale of the Phaedrus has
reunitedthe two necessarypartsthat make up the hybridtechne of the soul.
Beyond Magic: Why the Relation of Rhetoric and Philosophy Demand
That the Noble and Base Horses Remained Forever Hitched
At the end of Book VI of the Republic, Plato has Socrates notice the
bedazzled interlocutors who have just struggled to understand the intricate
details of the divided line. Book VII begins with Socrates attemptingto care for
these looks that suggest confusion by telling the allegory of the cave to explicate
in anothermannerthe dense argumentssurroundingthe Divided Line. Perhaps
this ratherunconventionalreadingof the Gorgias and the Phaedrus leaves some
in a similar condition to those at the close of Republic Book VI. Against the
backdropof this readingthat has pushed the relation of philosophy and rhetoric
constantly to the fore, I shall argue for a strong, but I hope creative, misreading
or retelling of anotherof Plato's famous myths. Rhetoric as a concern of Plato's
has always been motivated by his moral concern for the soul and that these
discussions could not but help deal with Plato's metaphysical positions on the
soul. And this, of course, includes the role of eros and its relationto the soul: "It
is towards the soul then that all the rhetorician'senergies will be directed"and
again "The functionof speech is to influencethe soul" (Phaedrus 27 la and d).
We have establishedthat the relationbetween philosophy and rhetoricis the
concern of Plato in the Gorgias and the Phaedrus. Further,we have from this
position argued that what others see as rhetoric's passing place is really central
to these two works. The appearancein these works of detailed and elaborate
discussions of morality and justice are thus attributedto concerns for rhetoric
and the necessity of philosophy having a voice. Said differently, rhetoricis not
seen as an addendumto these discussions of morality and justice. Plato's fear of
rhetoricis inextricablylinked to his metaphysicalconcerns for justice.

A HybridTechne of the Soul?

259

The myth of the charioteertells the story of the hybridstructureof the soul.
The story recounts the image of a charioteerwho must guide two horses whose
pull is in very different directions. The two horses are said to representthe two
parts of the soul, the noble and the base. The charioteermust bring these two
steeds into line such that they together draw the chariot straight. In the
confrontation with an object of beauty, the two struggle, at odds with one
another,for the form the relation to the beautiful object will take. (Remember
that the sight of beauty taken in by the senses is the first clue to the sight of the
eye of the mind that draws the soul toward the Forms.) I have suggested above
that any story aboutthe care of another's soul might also be read as a story about
the relationbetween philosophy and rhetoricbecause to invoke the techne fitting
of the soul (philosophy), one only has recourse to touch the soul by means of
discursivepractice(rhetoric).
Accordingly, then, let me consider what this story tells us if we read it as
the story of philosophy and rhetoricon Plato's account. The noble horse and the
base horse are bridled together, and Plato never suggests that the attempt be
made to separatethem. They representfor him the given conditionsin which we
find ourselves, so it is with this team and with this constitutionthat we must
deal. What then follows for the relation between these two horses? Let me state
the obvious as I see it on this misreadingaccount of which horse has the task of
representingwhich of the constitutive parts in the relation between philosophy
and rhetoric.
The noble horse, it will surprise no one, is philosophy and the base horse
rhetoric. Nevertheless, the absence of our surprise is not the simultaneous
absence for a set of reasons as to why these distinctions are made. Plato was
clear even in his concessions to rhetoric that it cannot have everythingor that it
did not still harbor dangers. The base horse represents rhetoric because it is
strong enough to run wild and to drag the noble horse behind it. Without
philosophy as the stride of the noble horse, the base horse can have its way and
lead the charioteerinto the irrationalitiesof flattery as expounded both in the
Gorgias and the Phaedrus.
The task Plato demands from the charioteeris that she bring her study and
skill to the reins and restrainthe base horse while simultaneouslybringing the
noble horse into its stride. It is, and this is corroboratedby the rest of the
arguments in the Phaedrus, only when both philosophy and rhetoric are in
synchronizationand in harmony can one be said to be on the just path. We
cannot simply unhitch the base horse (rhetoric) because of the dangers it
portends. If Plato thought this was possible in the Gorgias, he has come to
realize the impossibilityof this attemptin the Phaedrus.

26()

RhetoricReview

The base horse running unrestrained represents the worst examples of the
abuse of discourse. Yet the noble horse cannot run alone at all. Each noble horse
needs its grounding in this world. The noble horse, even if it is able to run alone
somewhere, cannot do so in this world. For this world it needs the desire for the
other and access to the other that is made possible by the base horse (rhetoric)
(see White). It needs the strength of the base horse's contact with the world to
advance the chariot to the other, to the polis, and to the chance at
communication. Plato may have wanted an all noble team of horses, but the
existential reality of the necessity of discourse forced him to keep the base horse
rhetoric hitched to the enterprise of caring for the soul.
For our contemporary situation, it is Plato's efforts to teach the importance
of bringing the two steeds into unison that one must ultimately respect even if
one rejects the specifics of his metaphysics and the details of his equestrian
advice. We gain something perhaps by seeing this conflict near its beginnings.
In What Is Called Thinking, Heidegger uncondemningly gives Kant an "F" for
his reading of Plato, suggesting that by betraying the history of traditional
readings from the history of philosophy, Kant succeeds in giving us something
new. Perhaps we need to make readings of Plato that merit failure so that we can
make readings of him that make a pass at being relevant to twentieth-century
concerns. In this respect I wish to read Plato two ways: on the one hand, with a
deep respect for the letter of the his texts and on the other, with an equal respect
for the spirit that lives within them.
By misreading perhaps we can put these horses in a different pasture, to
graze a different terrain so that today we might beckon them still with the line:
Come forward, noble creatures, and persuade.
Note
'The author has accrued many debts in the writing of this essay and is hopeful that
acknowledgmentwill signal a recognitionof them without believing such recognitioncould by itself
repay. The germ of this idea first occurredin a seminarsome years ago with Professor Don Burks
whose patience with the thesis allowed it to matureratherthan to die a quick-even if brightly litdeath. The work has been encouragedfor some time by Professor John T. Kirby, whose insistence
that the details should be worked out was the only thing that kept the project going. The authoris
grateful to all those students who shared the classroom and with keen eyes read Plato. Lastly,
Rhetoric Reivew peer reviewers professors Richard Enos and Edward Schiappa gave this essay
readingsthat led to so many fine suggestions-the author'sunderstandingof which are reflected on
nearly every page-that the essay now seems to have been impossible withoutthem.
Works Cited
Benardete,Seth. The Rhetoricof Moralityand Philosophy: Plato's Gorgias and Phaedrus. Chicago:
U of Chicago P, 1991.
Curran,Jane V. "The Rhetorical Technique of Plato's Phaedrus." Philosophy and Rhetoric 19.1
(1986): 66-72.

A HybridTechne of the Soul?

261

Derrida, Jacques. "Khora."On the Name. Trans. lan Mcleod. Standford:StandfordUP, 1995. 89127.
"Plato'sPharmacy."Dissemination.Trans.and Intro.B. Johnson.Chicago: U of Chicago P,
1981. 63-171.
"White Mythology."Margins of Philosophy. Trans.Alan. Bass. Chicago: U of Chicago P,
1982.
Enos, RichardLeo. GreekRhetoricbeforeAristotle. ProspectHeights, IL: Waveland, 1993.
. Roman Rhetoric: Revolution and the Greek Influence. Prospect Heights, IL: Waveland,
1995.
Heidegger, Martin.WhatIs Called Thinking?Trans.F. D. Wieck and J. G. Gray. New York: Harper,
1968.
Howland, R. L. "TheAttackon Isocratesin the Phaedrus."Classical Quarterly31 (1937): 151-59.
Johnstone, Henry."FromPhilosophy to Rhetoric and Back." Rhetoric, Philosophy, and Literature:
An Exploration.Ed. Don Burks.West Lafayette,IN: PurdueUP, 1978. 49-66.
Kahn, Charles,H. "Dramaand Dialectic in Plato's Gorgias." OxfordStudies in AncientPhilosophy I
(1983): 75-119.
Levi, ALbertWilliam. "Love, Rhetoric, and the AristocraticWay of Life." Philosophy and Rhetoric
17.4(1984): 189-208.
McComiskey, Bruce R. "DisassemblingPlato's Critique of Rhetoric in the Gorgias (447a-466a)."
RhetoricReview 11.1 (1992): 79-90.
Moline, Jon. Plato on Persuasionand Credibility.Philosophy and Rhetoric 21.4 (1988): 260-78.
Nietzsche, Friedrich."Homer'sContest."The Portable Nietzsche Selected, Trans., Intro, Prefaces,
and Notes, Walter.Kaufmann.New York:Penguin, 1976.
Olson, Gary A. "Jacques Derrida on Rhetoric and Composition: A Conversation." Journal of
AdvancedComposition 10.1 (1990): 1-21.
Plato. Phaedrus.Trans.WalterHamilton.New York: Penguin, 1973.
.Gorgias, Trans.Robin Waterfield.New York: Oxford UP, 1994.
Robinson, Richard. "Socratic Definition." The Philosophy of Socrates: A Collection of Critical
Essays. Ed. GregoryVlastos. Notre Dame: U of Notre Dame P, 1980. 61-75.
Romilly, Jacquelinede. Magic and Rhetoricin Ancient Greece. Cambridge:HarvardUP, 1975.
Schiappa, Edward. "Did Plato Coin the Word Rhetorike?" American Journal of Philology 111
(1990a): 460-73.
."Isocrates'Philosophia and ContemporaryPragmatism."Rhetoric, Sophistry,Pragmatism.
Ed. Steven. Mailloux. Cambridge:CambridgeUP, 1995. 33-60.
. "Neo-Sophistic Rhetorical Criticism or the Historical Reconstruction of Sophistic
Doctrines?"Philosophy and Rhetoric23.3 (1990b): 192-217.
.Protagoras and Logos: A Study in Greek Philosophy and Rhetoric. Columbia: U of South
CarolinaP, 1991.
. "Rhetorike:What's in a Name? Toward a Revised History of Early Greek Rhetorical
Theory."QuarterlyJournal of Speech 78 (1992): 1-15.
Schrag, Calvin O. "RhetoricResituatedat the End of Philosophy."QuarterlyJournal of Speech 71
(1985): 164-74.
White, F. C. "TheGood in Plato's Gorgias." Phronesis 35. 2 (1990): 117-27.

RhetoricReview

262

Ramsey Eric Ramsey is a philosopherand communicationscholar currentlyteaching courses in the

philosophy of communication,ethics, and rhetoricat Arizona State University West in Phoenix. He
is the author of The Long Path to Nearness, a philosophic study of ethics, communication,and
corporeality.

P#

Rhetoric Review Back Issues Available

The following issues ofRR are available at the single copy price of $10.00, includingmailing: 2.1,
16.1, 16.2, and
2.2,3.2, 4.1, 4.2, 6.2, 7.2, 8.1, 8.2, 10.2,11.1,11.2,12.1,12.2,13.1,13.2,14.1,15.2,
17.1. All twenty-one back issues may be purchasedas a groupfor only $100.00, includingmailing.
Vohmes 1.1, 1.2, 3.1, 5.1, 5.2, 6.1, 7.1, 9.1, 9.2, 10.1, 14.2, and 15.1 are available only as
photocopies. The price for each is $11.00, includingmailing Ordersfor individualback issues must
be prepaid Ordersfrom departmentsand librariesmay be billed Please write to the addressbelow,
e-mail (enos@u rizona.edu),or fax (520/621-7397), indicatingwhich back issue(s) you would like:
RhetoricReview, TheresaEnos, Editor,Depatment of English, University of Arizona,Tucson, AZ
85721.