Why Did Plato Write Dialogues?

Excerpt

The title of this essay poses a question that cannot be definitively answered. It is impossible to know exactly why Plato (429–347 b.c.e.) wrote dialogues, strange hybrids of fiction and philosophy, instead of theoretical treatises in which he straightforwardly stated and then defended his views with rational argument. After all, no explicit explanation, either from him or a contemporary, is known to exist. Naturally, this has not stopped scholars from trying to fill the void. The Roman biographer Diogenes Laertius (180–240 a.d.), for instance, suggested that Plato was born with an artistic temperament. As he put it, in his youth Plato “applied himself to painting and writing poems—first dithyrambs, then lyric poetry and tragedies.” Even after “he listened to Socrates”, was converted to philosophy and “burned his poems”, his literary spark was never fully extinguished.¹ …