Common threads · 6 books
Read selected dialogues from Complete Works, then study justice, knowledge, ethics, and political rule with modern scholars. This is a topic course, not every dialogue in sequence.
Books, curator notes, and what to read next.
Plato
Read Euthyphro, Apology, Meno, and Republic from the Cooper/Hutchinson collection. The 1997 date belongs to this anthology; the dialogues are ancient.
Next: An Introduction to Plato's Republic
Julia Annas
Annas offers a guide to the Republic's arguments. Use it to test how the city, education, and the soul fit together.
Next: Plato's Ethics
Terence Irwin
Irwin traces the ethical arguments across dialogues. Ask what remains stable and what changes in Plato's account of a good life.
Next: Plato on Knowledge and Forms
Gail Fine
Read the essays selectively after the dialogues. Compare competing explanations of how knowledge and Forms are connected.
Next: Plato: Political Philosophy
MALCOLM SCHOFIELD
Schofield situates Plato's political thought beyond one ideal city. Compare the Republic with later questions about law and citizenship.
Next: The Fragility of Goodness
Martha Nussbaum
Greek tragedy and philosophy become tests of whether a good life can be secured against luck and loss.
Also includes The Fragility of Goodness
Use selected treatises from Basic Works, with scholarly guides to explanation, flourishing, and politics. The route names its scope rather than claiming to cover the entire corpus.
Also includes The Fragility of Goodness
Pleasure, dignity, luck, and flourishing. Test the idea that a good life is simply a life with more happiness in it.
More paths featuring Martha Nussbaum
A political philosophy seminar on rights, distribution, oppression, and capabilities. Try each theory on the same real disagreement.
