The Oxford Handbook of Plato

Plato is the best known, and continues to be the most widely studied, of all the ancient Greek philosophers. The twenty-one commissioned articles in The Oxford Handbook of Plato provide in-depth and up-to-date discussions of a variety of topics and dialogues. The result is a useful state-of-the-art reference to the man many consider the most important philosophical thinker in history. Each article is an original contribution from a leading scholar, and they all serve several functions at once: they survey the lay of the land; express and develop the authors' own views; and situate those views within a range of alternatives. This Handbook contains chapters on metaphysics, epistemology, love, language, ethics, politics, art and education. Individual chapters are devoted to each of the following dialogues: the Republic, Parmenides, Theaetetus, Sophist, Timaeus, and Philebus. There are also chapters on Plato and the dialogue form; on Plato in his time and place; on the history of the Platonic corpus; on Aristotle's criticism of Plato, and on Plato and Platonism.
"The volume's greatest strength is its evenness: with few exceptions, the articles are pitched at the same level as one another, rendering the pieces equally accessible to their audience. Another strength is its thoroughness: it appears to leave no real topical stone unturned in its efforts to acquaint the reader with Plato and Platonic scholarship." -- Philosophy in Review

"Evokes new ideas and challenges to readers of Plato."
--Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews

"[T]he collection succeeds remarkably well in offering fresh perspectives on a number of themes in Plato's work while avoiding excessive scholarly wrangling or overly technical discussions of individual passages.... the collection accomplishes what should be its primary purpose -- turning readers toward Plato with a fresh set of interpretive perspectives and questions for further exploration." --Bryn Mawr Classical Review

INTRODUCTION ; PLATO IN HIS TIME AND PLACE ; THE PLATONIC CORPUS ; PLATO'S WAYS OF WRITING: REPRESENTATION AND REFLECTION ; THE EPISTEMOLOGY AND METAPHYSICS OF SOCRATES ; SOCRATIC ETHICS AND MORAL PSYCHOLOGY ; PLATO'S EPISTEMOLOGY ; PLATO'S METAPHYSICS ; PLATO'S PHILOSOPHY OF LANGUAGE ; PLATO ON THE SOUL ; PLATO'S ETHICS ; PLATO ON LOVE ; PLATO'S POLITICS ; PLATO ON EDUCATION AND ART ; THE REPUBLIC ; THE PARMENIDES ; THE THEAETETUS ; THE SOPHIST: HOW PLATO POSES AND SOLVES TWO PROBLEMS ABOUT STATEMENTS ; THE TIMAEUS AND THE PRINCIPLES OF COSMOLOGY ; THE PHILEBUS ; PLATO AND ARISTOTLE IN THE ACADEMY: AN ARISTOTELIAN CRITICISM OF PLATONIC FORMS ; PLATO AND PLATONISM ; BIBLIOGRAPHY