The Madness of Philosophy: On Enthusiasm and Irony in Plato

Plato’s definition of philosophy as a mania (in Phaedrus) in the first place distances philosophy from prudence of the so called common sense and places it between the enthusiastic madness of poets and clairvoyants on the one hand, and ironic concealment on the other, which in this very madness prove to be parts of the same question: How can that which is unhidden be revealed in the hidden? Erotic enthusiasm of philosophy is a special sort of madness. It is the paradoxical closeness that is rendered possible by distance. Approaching the distant is recollection. Recollection is by no means a reproduction of anything, but a (loving) thought of that which is always preconceived in previous intelligibility (disclosure of everything), so that it is always being concealed in it. Out of this, the wondering and amazement brings back the unforgettable in Plato’s philosophy, the unusual measures of poetry and of our own oblivion.