Rhetorical Defence, Inter-poetic Agōn and the Reframing of Comic Invective in Plato’s Apology of Socrates

Abstract

This chapter identifies the features that are shared by Aristophanic comedy and Plato’s Apology of Socrates. Those similarities include specific rhetorical arguments employed by the main characters in order to criticise their enemies in front of a civic audience, which is willing to enjoy the pleasures of vituperation and verbal violence. Paying attention to the staging of comic invective in each genre reveals some of the elaborate methods employed by Plato to confront comedy and its influence by means of the consolidation of an efficient “inter-poetic agōn”. The chapter shows that an examination of the Apology based on the importance of the rhetorical construction of Socrates’ defence can greatly profit from a comparison with Aristophanes’ Acharnians. In that regard, while the Clouds is often quoted in order to trace the root of the offences included in the judicial indictment against Socrates, a comparative approach to the defence strategies employed in the Acharnians can reveal new links and contribute to a better understanding of Plato’s verbal hostility towards Socrates’ adversaries.