Apology (Plato) - The Text

The Text

Xenophon, who wrote his own Apology of Socrates, indicates that a number of writers had published accounts of Socrates' defense. According to one prominent scholar, "Writing designed to clear Socrates' name was doubtless a particular feature of the decade or so following 399 BC". Many scholars guess that Plato's Apology was one of the first, if not the very first, dialogues Plato wrote, though there is little if any hard evidence. Plato's Apology is commonly regarded as the most reliable source of information about the historical Socrates.

Except for two brief exchanges with Meletus (at 24d-25d and 26b-27d), where the monologue becomes a dialogue, the text is written in the first person from Socrates' point of view, as though it were Socrates' actual speech at the trial. During the course of the speech, Socrates twice mentions Plato as being present (at 34a and 38b). There is, however, no real way of knowing how closely Socrates' words in the Apology match those of Socrates at the actual trial, even if it was Plato's intention to be accurate in this respect. One contemporary criticism of Plato's Apology is perhaps implied by the opening paragraphs of Xenophon's Apology, assuming that the former antedated the latter; Xenophon remarks that previous writers had failed to make clear the reason for Socrates' boastful talk (megalēgoria) in the face of the death penalty. Xenophon's account disagrees in some other respects with the details of Plato's Apology, but he nowhere explicitly claims it to be inaccurate.