Plato himself was enslaved, briefly, when he left Syracuse for the first time. He did not live as a slave, but was bought immediately by a friend on Aegina and restored to his home and his possessions. Perhaps it was that experience, combined with knowing Phaedo, that made him rethink the whole system which most people of his day took for granted. Although he was rich and well-born, Plato wanted no buying and selling of people, and no hereditary castes of people forced into doing unpleasant work. The system he proposed in the Republic was radical for his time.

In our time, much of that necessary work is done by Workers, who find it at worst a little tedious.

I am sorry Plato never knew about us and the possibilities we embody.

II. On Art

Plato says that it is necessary for art to make an argument that it is beneficial to the soul as well as enticing to it. He leaves this question open at the end of The Republic, saying he will listen whenever the argument is made, in prose or verse, and that he’d like to resolve the quarrel between poetry and philosophy. Many people, from Aristotle on, have taken up the gauntlet and defended poetry, or more widely, art. Here in the Republic, so many people have attempted it that I should be embarrassed to add to their number. Nevertheless, I shall do so.

It seems to me, as an artist, and as one of the more well-regarded artists among Workers, that art can come at philosophical issues sideways, and open the soul to them where otherwise the mind might throw up bastions against the truth. Many people from other cities, and especially from Athenia, have said to me that my colossus The Last Debate has made them understand what a horror Athene’s transformation of Sokrates was, even though they had known the facts of the matter their entire lives beforehand. Perhaps even more important than showing good examples, art can cut straight through to uncomfortable truths.

Humans have told me my work made them cry. Saeli have told me it made them rock to and fro. Workers have told me it made them know themselves for the first time.

This is an immense responsibility, and while art (even poetry, even music) is certainly a craft and requires crafting skills, I believe for this reason it is best practiced by philosophers.

I said this more concisely in my colossus Art Confronting Truth, which stands in Hieronymo. There the two obsidian figures reflect in each other to reveal a third figure.

III. On Helplessness