ATHENS, GREECE—Historians identified an original copy of Plato’s self-drafted “About the Author” on Thursday that provides an intimate glimpse into the late philosopher’s personal life. For over 2000 years, rumors of its sensational content have been documented in nearly every Western society, and experts were thrilled to confirm that it was uncovered in what appears to be an unmarked grave site in Plato’s backyard.
“The public is so excited to finally have this information. In today’s day and age, it’s really hard for people to deal with any celebrity’s private life. And now, all those millennials don’t have to keep speculating about Plato’s,” said archaeologist Zara Kingsley while she blew off the thin film of dust that had accumulated on the document over time.
“What’s especially interesting about it is that there is no evidence that anyone asked Plato to write it. From what we can tell, it started out as an unprompted author bio, but it somehow morphed into an incredibly personal diary entry. We deduce that Plato sat down to write a pithy autobiography, but he was probably having a rough day and needed to vent.”
The document begins, “Aristocles ‘Plato,’ son of Ariston, was born during the so-called ‘Golden Age’ of Athens, but he’s pretty sure that being alive sucks no matter what age it is. He aspires to be the omnipotent Philosopher King of his hometown. He found a stray cat once and hoped to keep it, but it died shortly afterward.” There are what appeared to be dried tears along with doodles of the aforementioned cat all over the margins of his papyrus.
The entry contains a great deal of information outlining the politics, economy, and everyday life in Athens during and after Pericles’s rule, but researchers stress the importance of Plato’s personal complaints about friends, family, and romantic partners.
“I know that Socrates always taught me to seek the truth within everyone, but I’m starting to think that Aristotle just really sucks. He keeps screaming at me to focus on the ‘here and now,’ or whatever, and I’m getting pretty damn sick of it. It’s like he doesn’t even care about my future,” Plato continues.
Toward the end of the entry, he writes, “Ugh! [roughly translated] I’ve been growing my beard out, and my parents keep telling me to cut it. I’m reaching the end of my rope here, but all I really care about is whether Dion likes it. He’s been acting pretty distant, so I’ve been looking to spice things up. Or maybe he’s just not into me like that???” Historians found it especially interesting that Plato dotted the “i” in Dion’s name with a heart.
At press time, historians were analyzing a self portrait of Plato in which he is holding a rather fuzzy stylus and is laying on his family’s triclinium with his legs playfully crossed behind him.
