Censorship of the Arts in Plato's The Republic
Western Philosophy and the Restriction of Poetry
May 25, 2009
He views artists as too self involved, concerned with and ruled by only their emotions and their imagination, without any real knowledge or truth. He had an idealist view of how society should be, with reason and rationality being necessities, and to achieve this believed that art and the influence of its creators were an obstacle to be overcome.
For the Good of Society
Freedom of speech is ruled out, and this is strongly enforced, with writers and artists whose creations were deemed unsuitable for public viewing being forced to move out of the city. Rather than a personal adversity to the arts, Plato believed that it would truly be for the good of society. He follows with the thought that rulers of society need to do what is best for the masses, and also protect their own leadership, and therefore any threat to their position must be eradicated at any cost.
Plato’s negativity towards the arts was partially influenced by Socrates, who he writes as being against artistic influence as it cannot give any real meaning. He writes that both writing and painting are inanimate, and that they cannot give answers to any questions. “You could fancy they speak as though they were possessed of sense, but if you wish to understand something they say, and question them about it, you find them ever repeating but one and the self-same story.” Therefore anyone who comes across certain pieces of art could get the wrong impression of it, and misunderstand its meaning.
Showing Images of Good
However, he did not want to get rid of the arts completely, he just wanted the power to choose which pieces were available to the public. His view in The Republic is that only images of good must be portrayed. “We must speak to our poets and compel them to impress upon their poems only the image of the good, or not to make poetry in our city".
Plato’s solution was to rid the city of those who could not be trusted to only show things that would allow people to be influenced to do what was good and right. He wanted artists and craftsmen who could influence the youth of the city, “from fair works of art there smite upon their eyes and ears an affluence like a wind bringing health from happy regions” which would lead them into goodness, “likeness and friendship and harmony with the principle of beauty”.
The Importance of Reason
This way, people would be trained from a young age to appreciate beauty and “ugly things he would rightly condemn, and hate even in his youth before he was capable of reason; but when reason comes he would welcome her as one he knows, with whom his training has made him familiar”.
Plato placed strong emphasis on the importance of reason. He wanted a composed and rational order of state, and viewed emotion and imagination as the enemy of clarity and logic. This was the catalyst for his advocation of censorship. By only being shown things of importance and worth, the generation growing up at that time would be programmed perfectly to do what is ‘right’, without being distracted by whimsical daydreams or unnecessary desires.
This is to ensure that they grow up to be as beneficial to the state as possible, as "on their absolute integrity depends the well-being of the whole community".
