For Plato & Lt; Symposium & Gt; In The Interpretation Of Love"

Plato’s "Symposium" is mainly composed of six encomiums for eros. The six therein as a whole, is a rising structure as well as the ladder of love. This dialog has two clues; one is six articles of laudations in the praise of love, or say, subliming love; the other is the gradually rising understanding about eroticism of the six people who deliver speeches. This paper intends to interpret the eroticism involved in the six articles of laudations, attempting to put forward its own understanding of Plato’s idea about eroticism and the relationship between that and human beings. Based on the analysis of different understanding about eroticism by different people, the paper tries to clarify the relationship between eroticism and human beings, thus making a further research into human nature. Seven typical characters are arranged by Plato for his view on eros to be expressed in the "symposium". They are eloquent communicator, solicitor, doctor, comedy poet, tragic poet, philosopher and politician. Each person, in their own position, tries to understand eros with reasonable or unreasonable explanations at the same time, which forms a grasp in whole at the desire. This paper mainly uses analytical method and I try to make own understanding by reading text carefully and learning from others research achievements. The structure of this article is very clear and the structure itself also contains some implied meaning of Plato. So most researchers analyze and read it in accordance with the text structure. I also use the method to construct the frame of this paper and interpret Plato’s thoughts based on text structure.