In his famous outburst before the gathered men of the Symposium, Plato has Alcibiades declare that behind his ‘Silenus-like’ mask, Socrates is full of ‘divine and golden images’. He can see the gold where others see only the mask, and it is this which makes Alcibiades so desperate for the old man’s approbation.
Alcibiades comes, like many students, to describe the way he feels for his old master as ‘love’. What he is really grappling with is something altogether more fragile: the sense of mentorship. The closeness of a teacher is sometimes more intense, and more confusing, than love. It is also a rare thing, growing rarer in proportion to the institutionalisation of education.
John Berger and Me: A migrant’s eye by Nikos Papastergiadis
Giramondo, $32.95 pb, 203 pp
ABR receives a commission on items purchased through this link. All ABR reviews are fully independent.
If you are an ABR subscriber, you will need to sign in to post a comment.
If you have forgotten your sign in details, or if you receive an error message when trying to submit your comment, please email your comment (and the name of the article to which it relates) to ABR Comments. We will review your comment and, subject to approval, we will post it under your name.
Please note that all comments must be approved by ABR and comply with our Terms & Conditions.