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Socrates Death Scene Analysis

Decent Essays

Both works of art depict the scene of Socrates and his impending death, although there are some paltry and major differences between the painting and the dialogue. During the text, the readers are only aware of Crito being inside the jail cell along with Socrates. In the painting, we glimpse a plentitude of individuals witnessing Socrates drink hemlock. As everyone interprets the death scene a bit differently, most everyone will come to understand that others will produce their own conjecture about how Socrates’ death actually happened. With Crito being the only witness, the readers may never know how Plato actually wrote this dialogue and the validity behind it. With an innumerable number of different stories, opinions and assumptions, …show more content…

Crito mentions how he can bribe the guard and allow Socrates to escape, but Socrates refuses. This demonstrates how Crito is being selfish and only trying to fend for himself.

With less comparable ideas than differentiating ideas, viewers can still find generalities that are similar between the painting and the dialogue. For example, the setting remained the same. Socrates remained in his jail cell for the duration of his trail throughout his execution. Within the jail cell, Socrates’ attitude remained the same. In both pieces, readers can tell that Socrates is feeling no emotions other than acceptance. He is ready to proceed with his death, peacefully. Viewers can only assume that the followers in the painting were trying to break Socrates out of prison just as persistently as Crito was right before Socrates’ execution. In the painting, Jacques displays individuals practically on their knees begging Socrates not to drink the hemlock, but instead follow them to freedom. In the painting, David paints Crito still trying to reason with Socrates, as he was in the text, although they both know that it is too late and nothing can change the process of fate.

Overall, the audience can observe that these two works of ancient art and text have a stunning amount of ideas to compare and contrast. The emotions exerted in these two scenes are quite alike, but they are different in the aspect of how the story actually went down in history. If

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