INTRODUCTION TO THE THEAETETUS

Statesman, pervaded by a subtle and at the same time ponderous kind of humour which is rather irritating to some, at least, among modern readers. The reasoning is careful and accurate, but the exposition is somewhat too prolix for modern taste.

The date of the Theaetetus is uncertain, but it cannot be one of the early dialogues. The mention of the Athenian army at Corinth makes any date much earlier than 390 impossible. At the very end the reader is prepared for a continuation of the conversation, and this takes place in the Sophist, but that dialogue and the Statesman may very well have been written some years later than the Theaetetus, from which they differ considerably in style.

There are separate editions of the Theaetetus by Lewis Campbell (Oxford, 1861 and 1883) and B. H. Kennedy (Cambridge, 1881 and 1894), both with translation and notes.