La concepción de la retórica en el Fedro de Platón

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to show that Plato’s critical approach towards rhetoric is essentially the same in the Gorgias and in the Phaedrus, and that his criticism in both dialogues points to the same features of rhetoric: lack of knowledge and of moral excellence. We try to show that between both dialogues there is no essential change in Plato’s attitude to rhetoric, because neither in the Phaedrus does the philosopher pretend to raise it to the status of a téchnē. The «true rhetoric» Plato talks about at the end of this dialogue is nothing but his own philosophical-political art: dialectic, since it consists of gathering together and dividing kinds of souls and speeches.