All Craftsmen Are Makers
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Diotima — ποίησις, ὥστε καὶ αἱ ὑπὸ πάσαις ταῖς τέχναις ἐργασίαι ποιήσεις εἰσὶ καὶ οἱ τούτων δημιουργοὶ πάντες ποιηταί.
Socrates — ἀληθῆ λέγεις.
Diotima — ἀλλʼ ὅμως, ἦ δʼ ἥ, οἶσθʼ ὅτι οὐ καλοῦνται ποιηταὶ ἀλλὰ ἄλλα ἔχουσιν ὀνόματα, ἀπὸ δὲ πάσης τῆς ποιήσεως ἓν μόριον ἀφορισθὲν τὸ περὶ τὴν μουσικὴν καὶ τὰ μέτρα τῷ τοῦ ὅλου ὀνόματι προσαγορεύεται. ποίησις γὰρ τοῦτο μόνον καλεῖται, καὶ οἱ ἔχοντες τοῦτο τὸ μόριον τῆς ποιήσεως ποιηταί.
Socrates — ἀληθῆ λέγεις, ἔφην.
making, so that even the workings under all the arts are makings, and the makers of these are all poets. True, you say. But nevertheless, said she, you know that they are not called poets, but have other names, and from all making one part marked off, the one concerning music and verse, is addressed by the name of the whole. For this alone is called poetry, and those who have this part of making are poets. True, I said.
Diotima drives the analogy home. Since the cause of anything's coming to be is 'making,' the workings under all the crafts are makings, and all their craftsmen are, strictly, poets. And yet we don't call them poets: from all of making one part — the part concerning music and verse — is marked off and given the name of the whole, 'poetry,' and only its practitioners are called poets. Socrates agrees.
Diotima's example is not idle: poetry is exactly the art whose prestige at this drinking party (Agathon is a tragedian, the guests trade quotations) makes it the natural case of a part mistaken for the whole. The move sets up 205d, where she applies the same logic to love: the wish for the good and for happiness is the whole of erōs, present in everyone, but we reserve the word 'love' for one species — the pursuit through bodies and persons — and call only its practitioners lovers. The businessman and the athlete are lovers too, in truth; they simply go after the good by other roads and get other names. By dissolving the narrow sense of both 'poet' and 'lover,' Diotima frees erōs to become what the ascent requires: a single upward desire that can be redirected from one beautiful body to all beauty and finally to Beauty itself.
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