Prose

Use in the book

Ctesippus distinguishes what Hippothales recounts καταλογάδην from the poems and written compositions with which he drenches his companions. The adverb identifies the form of the speech, not its subject. Prose and poetry alike concern Lysis.

The joke is comparative: the prose is dreadful, but becomes almost tolerable beside the poems, and singing makes matters worse still. Avoid translating the word simply as “in detail,” which would lose the contrast among narrated prose, composed verse, and performed song.

Places to read

1. 204dἃ μὲν καταλογάδην διηγεῖται — what he recounts in prose.

Use in the book

The rhythmic-prose fragment rejects language without character for a mind with a marked disposition. This does not make prose and verse identical; it asks what internal movement prose needs. Conversely prose can have too much harmony or sweetness, producing a seductive first pleasure that becomes intolerable. The Jourdain allusion points toward an everyday, unreflective kind of prose, but leaves its opening “when” unfinished. The category therefore ranges from ordinary speech to elaborately shaped writing, and a judgment about one level should not automatically govern the other.

Places to read

1. I, p. 419, entry 9, ¶4Prose may need measure, cadence and rhythm.
2. II, p. 815, entry 12, ¶1Excess harmony and sweetness become faults over time.
3. II, p. 542, entry 7, ¶1Jourdain’s unknowing prose supplies an unfinished example.

Translation in this edition

The English translation follows Joubert’s wording of the Molière allusion, including its give/bring verbs, instead of correcting it from the play. The nearby unresolved glacis image does not determine the meaning of prose or harmony.