The Republic | Study Guide

In the Republic, Plato focuses on the essential nature of justice and on the most important features of the ideal state. Plato presents his work in the form of a dialogue: a conversation between characters. The dialogue's central figure is Plato's teacher, the Greek philosopher Socrates (469–399 BCE), who serves as Plato's narrator and who advances a number of surprising and controversial ideas. These include the concept of the philosopher-king, a ruler who is single-mindedly devoted to truth and goodness.

For over two millennia the Republic has been regarded as a landmark work of political philosophy. Plato's major ideas in the dialogue—such as the true nature of justice, the doctrine of Forms and Ideas, and the immortality of the soul—powerfully influenced such later writers as Greek philosopher Aristotle, Roman politician Cicero, Christian philosopher St. Augustine, and English Renaissance philosopher St. Thomas More.