Pour qu'on lise Platon

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"Pour qu'on lise Platon" by Émile Faguet is a literary-philosophical essay written in the early 20th century. The work aims to make readers return to Plato by confronting why he is neglected, weighing his defects against his greatness, and proposing a practical way to read him fruitfully. It frames Plato’s thought through his visceral reactions to his time—especially after the death of Socrates—and examines his attacks on Athenians, democracy, sophists, poets, and traditional religion. Expect a lively, polemical guide that mixes close reading with cultural critique and advocacy.

The opening of this essay argues that Plato has become “scolaire,” skimmed in classrooms then abandoned, partly because his dialogues are long, repetitious, minutely dialectical, often inconclusive, and studded with obscurities and dated allusions—yet he remains a supreme poet, artist, and orator whose moral passion was ignited by Socrates. The author suggests reading for the large, clear lines of each dialogue, forming a simple overall plan, and only then returning to the texts. He then interprets Plato through his “hatreds” born of Socrates’ execution: disdain for Athenians’ frivolity and for democracy as institutionalized incompetence; a case against “government by laws” when they are either capriciously remade or rigidly inflexible; hostility to sophists as technicians of persuasion indifferent to the good; a sustained attack on poets and the “theatrocracy” for flattering crowds and corrupting morals; and the start of a critique of priests and traditional gods tied to prosecutions for impiety.