Google reading order for Plato

>google reading order for Plato
>as many lists as people claiming to know the best way

What gives?

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Just start with the republic bro :-)

Everyone's a fucking retard with an opinion.

Just look up the generally accepted chronological reconstruction, follow that, you're golden. Starts with low complexity dialogues that will seem boring because they're just refuting sophism, ramps up to Socrates' trial and death and starts talking about more metaphysical stuff, then you get the hardcore middle dialogues and then the really fun later dialogues after that.

The beginning part will be boring as a result. Ion is torture. Use a secondary source (or several) that tells you the "main point(s)" of each dialogue, ideally dividing up the sections and signposting them for you. Don't expect to get everything on your first pass--Plato is better the second time around when you know more philosophy.

This guy gets it, the obvious answer is always correct.

What is it with Veeky Forums and this reading order autism? Fucking hell, you haven't even read Plato yet, you don't need to act like you're doing a serious academic study of him.

This. Unless you actually study classical philology on an academic level it really doesn't matter. Pick some secondary literature, read and then read the dialogues you are actually interested in. All these textbooks are there for a reason.

fuck you mean ion is boring? It's 20 pages worth of Socrates shitting on some dude

I have the trial and death of socrates, am I safe to jump into that and just start? I also have The Republic.

Just start where you want. Actually reading Plato is going to be better than asking inane questions like this on Veeky Forums. The basic order for any author is usually chronological, now you never have to ask something like this again. If you're doing a serious study you will be re-reading anyway so the order doesn't really matter in the end.

The apology, crito and phaedo is the best place to start imo

Sweet. Can't wait

"Alcibiade" was always used as the intro traditionally.
Anglos will tell you to disregard it however.

>Just look up the generally accepted chronological reconstruction

This is a trick.

>Not reading them chronologically by dramatic date

You have much to learn my friends

>Symposium
>February 416
They better be taking about Agathon's party, and not the metanarrative because Alcibiades is dead when they tell the story.

Oh yeah, let's start with Parmenides, by far the hardest dialogue...

Reading order doesn't matter. Start anywhere

I'm reading "The Six books of Proclus; On the Theology of Plato" its over 1000 pages and absolutely cool.

Thomas Taylor was a pretty cool dude.

Gregory Sadler tells you what's up
m.youtube.com/watch?v=Ngk0tLuls1w

I'm trying but holy fuck this shit is utterly boring and it feels useless

>pick any book
>read it
>read a couple companion texts on the book
>read it again
>you now understand the book
>repeat 34 more times
>or read an overview written post-1750 and select texts discussed therein which interest you, if you're not a NEET

It's supposed to really make you think, if you're bored you're likely not thinking.

Also starting with "the republic" is a meme you shouldn't take seriously.

>post-1750
I think you mean "post-1950." Gregory Vlastos is a great scholar, but he tends to miss certain points and use academic language, which is not beginner-friendly.

Sadler himself didn't start with the greeks though

>Gregory Vlastos is a great scholar, but he tends to miss certain points

Vlastos misses a lot of points and his approach is already dated less than fifty years after his death. Forgive me, but I don't really like the guy.

When will this handsome obese man debate Peterson?

What gives, OP, is that Plato's works/dialogues were written such a long time ago, /that no one actually knows for sure exactly what order they were all written in/. So over the centuries various orderings/partial orderings have been proposed, often not even trying for chronology. Chronology is a modern sperg obsession which simply wasn't very important to the ancients.

That said, both modern scholarship and ancient ordering agree that the trial and death of Socrates (Euthyphro/Apology/Crito/Phaedo) is 1) "Early Plato" and 2) is the best jumping-off point. This tetraology is the first of Thrasyllus, the most authoritative ancient ordering (because it is the earliest one that we have, and it encompasses all of the extant, genuine work). After that you can read the Republic et al later. Then it's a grab-bag and it's up to you, you'd be just fine picking some modern proposed chronological ordering like this guy suggested - just understand that it's one particular academic opinion which not only does not everyone agree with, but (per Cooper), in many instances, /no actual hard evidence for features of orderings exists/.

The French edition of Plato's complete works orders them alphabetically.

That's as good an approach as any.

Chronological order is the best way of reading Plato because it shows the development of his thought. From the first dialogues which usually come to no definite conclusion to developed systematic concepts in the last dialogues.

>Chronological order is the best way of reading Plato because it shows the development of his thought.

We have no way of knowing that order though.
Plato revised his dialogues throughout his life.
The chronologists point to patterns in language as proof of validity for their interpretations, but revisions on Plato's mess with this. Later language could have been added to early works. etc.

Your approach is all about presupposing some imagined order and fitting the dialogues into this conjured framework. It's fine, but it has very little to do with reality.

no, not at all, absolutely not