Phaedrus, Plato and Socrates
In Phaedrus, a dialogue authored by Plato, a sagely Socrates and his student of rhetoric Phaedrus engage in thoughtful repartee in an earthy setting by a lush riverbank in the shade of a tree occupied by a chorus of cicadas.
These cicada are not supernumerary; they provide metaphorical richness, a salient musical motif and liminal hierophany to the dialogue of Socrates and Phaedrus.
It is in Phaedrus that Socrates states that some of life's greatest blessings flow from mania specifically in the four kinds of mania: (1) prophetic; (2) poetic; (3) cathartic; and (4) erotic. It is in this context that Socrates' Myth of the Cicadas is presented. The Cicadas chirp and watch to see whether their music lulls humans to laziness or whether the humans can resist their sweet song. Cicadas were originally humans who, in ancient times, allowed the first Muses to enchant them into singing and dancing so long that they stopped eating and sleeping and actually died without noticing it. The Muses rewarded them with the gift of never needing food or sleep, but to sing from birth to death. The task of the Cicadas is to watch humans to report who honors the Muses and who does not.
In the dialogue, Socrates affirms that nymphs and local divinities or spirits of place inhabit the countryside; talks of the Muses and nature gods such as Pan; in addition he indulges in an extended exegesis of his own dæmon; waxes lyrical, connecting divine inspiration to religion, poetry, art and love; all of which are informed and rendered in poignant relief by cicada chorus.
Read more about this topic: Cicada (mythology)
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