The Essential Irrationality of Political Life

• In Event: Moral and Theoretical Underpinnings of Political Life

Abstract

Starting with the Clouds, and continuing in the Birds, and Assemblywomen, Aristophanes shows his audience the political limits of reason and rationality. Setting himself in theatrically violent opposition to the philosopher Socrates, he explores the forces in political life that resist, or one might even say are impervious to, rational argument. In this paper, I will try to make the strongest case possible for this alternative to the philosophic view. I will also try to point out weaknesses in this case, the places where philosophy could begin to offer a rebuttal.

Author

• Lisa Leibowitz, Kenyon College