Description: This book represents the first publication of one of the seminars (transcribed) of Cornelius Castoriadis, a renowned and influential figure in 20th-century thought. A close reading of Plato's Statesman is an exemplary instance of Castoriadis's discriminating approach to thinking about and reading a great work.
Review Quotes: "This book is something of an event, since it is the first time in Castoriadis's multiverse and multivolume oeuvre that he focuses on a single text. Castoriadis's range of knowledge, both historical and epistemological, is legendary, but until now we have had only cursory and fragmented instances of his genius for close reading. The Statesman is arguably one of the most difficult and idiosyncratic of Plato's dialogues, and Castoriadis literally proceeds like a detective, peeling off the layers of this deliberately disorienting text and engaging the reader in a distinct intellectual dialogue, simultaneous with his dialogue with Plato."--Stathis Gourgouris, Princeton University