Diotima In Plato's Symposium

Plato creates an interesting character to his work, Symposium, with the addition of Diotima. Diotima is the only woman introduced during the all-male symposium and there is an essential understanding of life that comes from her being a woman. Symposiums that were held during the time of ancient Greece were strictly for males and their ideas. Women had no place, except for decoration. Plato choosing to add a female figure is out of the ordinary and quite surprising. Plato wrote the Symposium around 360 BC. During this time, the prevailing view of love and sex emphasized the importance for men to be dominant over females. Females were expected to view their role as “properly submissive”. Men viewed penetration as power and woman were viewed as sex

Diotima believes that sex isn’t about the physical act, but is about the desire of the mind. She approaches this idea through slow and careful ascent, instead of addressing it directly. She believes that love is a spirit that serves as a means of communication between the gods and humans. Love, the spirit, encompasses happiness, beauty, and wisdom and is resourceful and in need. Diotima believes that sex is important for reproduction of ideas and of humans. She thinks that sex and love are ways to reproduce and explore different ideas and perspectives. Many of her ideas agree with the thoughts of Alcestis and Achilles previously mentioned in the Symposium. Diotima thinks that lovers love what is good. The idea of Love being a spirit opposes Aristophanes idea that people were originally 2 halves, man-man, man-woman, and woman-woman, and these halves were split by Zeus as punishment. People now spend their lives looking for their correct other half. Perhaps it was better for Plato to use Diotima to contradict these beliefs, for if Socrates had stated these thoughts directly, he may have been viewed as