Dorothea Frede, “The many-faceted Socrates in Plato”

After some preliminary remarks about the differences in seriousness and un-seriousness in Plato’s dialogues, in agreement with the character of the interlocutors, I will discuss the following points: (1) Socratic self-descriptions, from the gad-fly to the mid-wife.  (2) The question whether the confinement of mid-wifery represents Plato’s fare-well to Socrates.  (3) The reception of the different ‘Socrateses’ in the Platonist tradition.  (4) The treatment of Plato’s Socrates in the Academy.  (5) Plato’s role in his school.  Upshot: The open-endedness of the discussions suggests that for Plato dialogue remained a Socratic enterprise throughout his life, even where Socrates is not on stage.