On 30 October the Verdaguer Room in the Barcelona Athenium hosted a presentation for the latest book by UIC Barcelona Faculty of Humanities lecturer, Bernat Torres. It is a commented translation of The Philebus by Plato, recently published by Edicions de la Ela Geminada. As part of the book presentation, Bernat Torres also gave a talk on “Plato and Hedonism” along with Ramon Llull University professor Antoni Bosch-Veciana. 

During the talk, both speakers focused on providing details of the ethical vision Plato had, that conflicts with hedonism. While the latter philosophical trend establishes pleasure as the highest aim and the basis of life, Plato states that-although pleasure is undeniable- it must be subject to criticism.  “Hedonism tells us how we should live and what the best guidance is for our life” underlined Torres.  “In the end- he said- all of this leads us to contemporary reflections on pleasure and pain”.   

Along the same lines, Doctor Bosch-Veciana explained how the concept of pleasure, as Plato sees it, undergoes a significant evolution throughout his work, to the point of confirming that plenitude involves achieving what is good and not what is pleasurable.  

At the end of the event, Torres explained that translating The Philebus took him six years. He stressed the complexity of the translation since, in his own words “translating each Greek term is impossible, due to the infinite interpretations each one has”.