Talk:Symposium (dialogue of Plato)

Symposion?

Shouldn't this be under its Greek title - "Symposion"? Peter Schmitt 21:11, 7 December 2009 (UTC)

Well, no, the Greek title is "Συμπόσιον". In English, its titled "Symposium", and as far as I'm aware, Citizendium is in English. –Tom Morris 22:34, 7 December 2009 (UTC)

English, yes, of course, but I think that works of art, etc. should live under their original title (with redirects, of course). And isn't the usual (full) title "The Symposium"? Peter Schmitt 12:55, 8 December 2009 (UTC)

The contents pages for both the current one-volume edition of Plato by John Cooper and the four-volume Benjamin Jowett edition from 1953 both list the dialogues without "the". The titles are prefixed with "the" in commentary - for instance, Jowett says "Of all the works of Plato the Symposium is the most perfect in form" (vol. 1, p. 479). I pulled out three tomes on Plato from my institution's library by Gregory Vlastos ('Plato I'), M. M. McCabe ('Plato's Individuals') and Terence Irwin ('Plato's Ethics'). All use "the Republic" orthography, although Irwin does occasionally use them without prefix: "My discussion of the Statesman, Philebus, and Laws is extremely selective..." Similarly, for the dialogues named after the Sophists or other interlocuters, including 'The' in the title makes no sense at all. "The Cratylus" makes about as much sense as "The Don Quixote" or "The Jane Eyre". I am no expert, but I tend to lean towards omitting "the". Shockingly, Wikipedians actually had an intelligent conversation regarding naming conventions for Platonic texts. –Tom Morris 13:50, 8 December 2009 (UTC)