So I’m writing a paper on Plato’s theory of knowledge, and a major aspect of that theory plays into his idea of a philosopher-king, as seen in Republic. I’m supposed to make references to film, literature, real life events, etc. and one of the first that popped out at me concerned Varys and his Pauper Prince. So I was wondering if you could expound a little on Varys and his idea of the philosopher-king, and its links back to Plato.

(Plato and Philosopher kings, 2) Don’t worry, I’ll give you a proper MLA citation. It’s a semi-hobby of mine to sneak tumblr into my works cited of my school papers 🙂

So I primarily discuss it here. The key thing to me is the way that Plato’s theory in the Republic that the state should be governed by philosopher-kings, who would be educated by philosophers who teach only men of virtue, changes after his experience in Syracuse.

In Syracuse, Plato attempts to put his ideas into practice. First, Dion, the brother-in-law of Dionysius the Tyrant of Syracuse becomes Plato’s disciple, and Plato hopes to influence the tyrant through him. But then Dionysius takes a dislike to Plato and has him sold into slavery, and Plato only escapes because a friend of his happened to be attending the right slave auction and buys his freedom. Then later Dionysius dies, Dion bring Plato back to tutor the old tyrant’s son, but Dionysius II ends up banishing his uncle and makes Plato his prisoner. And so on and so forth – lots of chaos and intrigue, very little philosopher-kinging going on.

In the Seventh Letter and the Laws, which Plato writes late in life, Plato argues instead for a second best city, less perfect than the Republic but more practical given the frailties of human nature. And what makes it more practical is that there are written laws which prevent a single, corruptible individual from having too much power. Many scholars have thus concluded that Plato’s Laws are a reaction to his failure in Syracuse. 

So what does this have to do with Varys? Well, as I state in my essay, Varys’ whole project is to raise a philosopher-king who can radically reform the state and society and thus bring about the greatest good for the greatest number of people. The problem is that Varys can’t guarantee the character of the man he educated, or that having educated him from afar, Aegon will actually listen to him.