Education as Self-Fashioning: The Greeks on Suffering, Beauty, and Wisdom

In Greek tragedies, a horrific catastrophe falls upon a person and brings on extreme suffering. For the Greeks, tragic plays offered the truth about life's calamities and horrors. The Greeks enjoyed these plays because the dramatic artistry made beauty out of horror and suffering. The Greeks did not believe that they controlled their fates. The Greeks had a "tragic wisdom" that enabled them to confront the hardships of life and the inevitability of death. This helped them to develop courage and resilience. Plato attacked this view and introduced a new kind of hero, the philosopher Socrates. As Plato claimed, we can control our fates by practicing philosophy: this enables us to become wise and ethically good. The philosopher strives for this goodness, which is beautiful in the highest possible way--it is our soul's true desire. Our inner goodness is under our control, so the good and wise person will stay happy even when calamities strike. Plato's optimistic philosophy flew in the face of Greek tragic wisdom. Plato offered a new way of living, one based on higher education, the development of knowledge, and the pursuit of true beauty and goodness. Do we believe that liberal education improves us ethically? Do we feel optimistic or pessimistic about life? To what extent can we control our lives and fates? How do tragic plays, movies, or TV shows represent the horrors that happen in the real world? Does the art that makes them beautiful and pleasurable help us to confront these horrors? Who are our heroes? What actions or qualities make them heroic? We read six tragedies by Sophocles and Euripides, and three Platonic dialogues (Apology, Symposium, Republic). We also read Nietzsche's Birth of Tragedy, which sets forth the opposition between Greek "tragic wisdom" and Plato's "philosophic knowledge."