A Drunk Man Against the Sober
Read the full text in our reader
Eryximachus — περὶ Ἔρωτος εἰπεῖν ὡς δύναιτο κάλλιστον, καὶ ἐγκωμιάσαι. οἱ μὲν οὖν ἄλλοι πάντες ἡμεῖς εἰρήκαμεν; σὺ δʼ ἐπειδὴ οὐκ εἴρηκας καὶ ἐκπέπωκας, δίκαιος εἶ εἰπεῖν, εἰπὼν δὲ ἐπιτάξαι Σωκράτει ὅτι ἂν βούλῃ, καὶ τοῦτον τῷ ἐπὶ δεξιὰ καὶ οὕτω τοὺς ἄλλους.
Alcibiades — ἀλλά,
Aristodemus — φάναι,
Alcibiades — ὦ Ἐρυξίμαχε,
Aristodemus — τὸν Ἀλκιβιάδην,
Alcibiades — καλῶς μὲν λέγεις, μεθύοντα δὲ ἄνδρα παρὰ νηφόντων λόγους παραβάλλειν μὴ οὐκ ἐξ ἴσου ᾖ. καὶ ἅμα, ὦ μακάριε, πείθει τί
to speak about Eros as best he could, and give a eulogy. Now the rest of us have all spoken; but since you haven't spoken and have drained your cup, it's right that you speak, and having spoken, give Socrates a command, whatever you like, and this man in turn the one on his right, and so the others. “But,” said “Eryximachus,” — Alcibiades — “you speak fairly, but a drunk man's words, matched with sober men's, is perhaps not on equal terms. And besides, my good sir, does he persuade you at all…”
Eryximachus finishes the proposal he began describing in 214b: since Alcibiades arrived late and drunk without giving a speech, he should now speak about Eros as everyone else has, then hand Socrates a command of his own choosing, who will pass one to the man on his right, and so on around the table. Alcibiades balks — comparing a drunk man's speech to the sober speeches already given hardly seems a fair contest — and turns instead to ask whether Socrates has actually persuaded him of anything, his question trailing off mid-sentence into 214d.
Eryximachus is trying to restore the order the party had before Alcibiades crashed it: a speech from each guest in turn, moving to the right (the same ἐπὶ δεξιά rule set at 213a), now recast as a game of commands — Alcibiades speaks, then gets to order Socrates, who orders his neighbor, and so down the couches. Alcibiades' answer refuses the premise before it starts. Setting a μεθύων (drunk man) against οἱ νήφοντες (the sober) isn't a fair contest, he says, and the joke cuts two ways: it excuses him from matching the evening's careful philosophy on Eros, and it quietly needles the sober speeches themselves, six speeches deep in wine by this point in any real dinner party. The distinction will not stay a joke. Later in his own speech Alcibiades will insist that wine, like children, makes people say what's true (217e), and this offhand plea of drunkenness now is the first move in that argument — he is already telling Agathon's table that whatever he says next should be trusted more, not less, for coming from an unsound man.
The pivot underneath this exchange is the real one: rather than take the topic already assigned, sober up, and speak about Eros, Alcibiades turns immediately to ask whether Socrates actually persuaded him of anything just said — a question that cuts off mid-sentence into 214d. Every speech so far, including Socrates', has been an ἐγκώμιον of Eros; Alcibiades is the first speaker to treat Socrates himself as the more interesting and more suspicious subject. Within a few lines he will be told to praise Socrates instead, and take it. The old subject of the dialogue doesn't survive the man who refuses to speak soberly about it.
Read the full commentary — and tap any word for its dictionary entry — in the interlinear reader.
Open Plato, Symposium 214c in the full reader
Always open passages in the reader
You are reading a page of the Plato, Symposium — the whole book is free in our interlinear reader.
The Great Library Project presses the classics in their original languages, glossed word by word — free to read, always. Browse the whole library.
Also on our shelves:
Plato, Symposium 214c — The Great Library Project interlinear edition · greatlibraryproject.com/book/symposium/214c/