PHILOSOPHISCHE PRAXIS 11- Konstanz 2025

Hinweis auf die Buchvorstellung 25.19.2025 im Museumscafé INSEL Reichenau. Bus 204, Halt MUSEUM 17 Uhr

philodrama WITH or WITHOUT Socrates 2025

Mike Roth, Uni Konstanz As 18.ICPP-participant listed in the programmes with a keynote under „Philotheatre Practice“ my time-slot and the location, the stage of the Antun Bauer Hall at the Faculty of Philosophy and Religious Studies, University of Zagreb, had just been cancelled 13.7.2025. When cameraman Karl and I were leaving the building, we bumped into Lou Marinoff. This was his immediate reaction: „Do the philodrama here?!“ (just outside – infront of the building – open air) And we did.

Free selective transcipt of Karl (4) Duelli´s video Socrates in Zagreb 2025 : 1 Socrates: Luka Janes 2 Crita - friend since childhood: Bojana Brajkov 3 public service - Jailer & author Mike Roth 3 is asking the cameraman Karl Dülli (4) if he is ready to shoot. 4 gives a positive sign WITH OR WITHOUT YOU 3: … This is a criminal. His name is – What´s your name? 1 (stretched out): Socrates 3 (placing an apricot into the hand of the victim) 3 (addressing the public): One of these two fruits is poisoned. . We´ll have him in a minute! 0.34 (of 8 min) 3 (giving the other fruit to 2): This may be good. It´s yours. 2: OK – thank you 3 (approaching 1, helping him to sit upright): You are going to die! 1 (theatralically): Going to die – … the way of the truth. (To 2) If you agree with my oppinion… 3 (turning his back to 1+2 and stepping into the front towards the audience): These two old [friends] – they have two fruits. One is fatally poisoned … The other is not. Both smell [inviting]. 1 (sniffing the apricot, holding it close to his nose) 3: Take a bite, come on! 2: Hey 3 (pointing to 1 and speaking to the public): He has done wrong so much. He rightfully must leave this life … 1: [Even] if this fruit is poisoned I will eat it 1.43 If I have said something wrong, if I poisoned anybody – I will eat … 3: Come on eat! Democracy wants you … 2: We cannot know it - 1 (interrupts): If democracy is the truth … I will surely eat. You want me to eat it? (pointing into the public) 3 (raising his two arms and screams) Yeah 1.57 (in a milder pitch of voice) Just try and have a fiftyfifty – chance – 2 (to1): … that could mean you survive and I die. 1: The smell of death is strong 2.22 I will eat them both [ …] 2: We need you [here]! 3.10 (interupting a rave of 1) You don´t understand … I understand and I love you 4.33 1: I think society must be protected 2: (overlapping) He don´t - 1: You don´t have a solution for me 2: I have a solution: don´t eat that fruit! 3 (to 1): Sail away … (2 overlapping) 1 (to 2): Let´s share the fruits – 2: ??? [unclear to M.R. – 5.18] 1 (going to break his fruit into halves): Yeah, come on! 3 (1 + 2 join in) (singing a popular tune + arm gesture, hands circling around each other): Let´s stay together [come on, come on] 3 (close to 1 & sharing a secret): Up to now there were just sophists all around. But NOW there is the chance to create something NEW: PHILOSOPHY 5.50 1: Oh, yes – I eat – for the [birth and] good of philosophy! (turning to 2) Come on now, eat half of it 6.03 We´ll both die and philosophy will live 2 (hesitates) – Philosophy will live WITH or WITHOUT you 6.10 1 (bites into his apricot): I am hungry for the truth (he is springing up to his feet and holds the fruit in the direction of 2) (1 is raving and is also offering his fruit to 3, who ignores that) 1: Oh, this is my fruit, my death. 2 and 3 (silent for a while) 3: I am [the jailer] - an officer of the state. [I stay] 1 SOCRATES (takes another bite and is sinking back) 7.27 3 (coming to hold the streched out left arm of 2 and helping him to lay down on the bench) 2 CRITA (calmly sitting, then rising to her feet and walking over the improvised stage, throwing her unpoisoned fruit into the air and catching it quite skillfully) 3 PHILODRAMA – director: … tried to fill in too many bits of philo practice into too small boxes of time! APPLAUSE 1 Luka Janeš rises: „I feel very good now“ { Cf. “ Now the hour to part has come. I go to die, you go to live. Which of us goes to the better lot is unknown to all “ Apology ἀλλὰ γὰρ ὁ χρόνος ἀπιέναι· ἐγὼ μὲν ἀποθνῄσκειν, ὑμεῖς δὲ ζῆν· ὁπότερον δὲ ἡμῖν ἐπ᾽ ἀμείνω, ἄδηλον παντὶ } (he gets back his cell phone & finding back to his role as ICPP2025 elected organiser): LET US WALK OVER NOW TO THE BUS BRINGING US TO THE PLACE OF THE CAFÉ PHILO [directed by Lou Marinoff] Karl´s (video) in Mike´s free transcript philodrama Socrates Zagreb 2025 uncut philodrama2025@gmail.com * . * (Self)REFLECTING TEAM - on Second Thought M: I formed the role of the central figure (with a characteristic left-arm- and-hand-with-pointing-finger gesture

as in DAVID´s 1787 grand painting THE DEATH OF SOCRATES) on occasion (1) of the 14th ICPP 2016 in Bern / Swiss Capital. And I started again this way in a philodrama workshop with plenty of time at the ICPP 2023 (2). Pia Houni was a participant and we agreed spontaneously that she would act as Socrates´ friend. In the role of Socrates I had given her the name CRITA. PIA HOUNI in the Timisoara -ICPP 2023 The jailer was Albert of Prague (see 3), another philo theatre activist. But in 2025 he did not want to be the jailer again. Would I then be the jailer, transforming this role and combining it with addressing the public as philodrama director in an al presto „Impro“ version done while waiting for the bus to take us into town? Luka wanted to act in the role of Socrates. I had met Bojana the first evening in a group around Lou and she agreed to act as the close friend of Socrates trying to save his life. Alternative Scene 1 B (in M´s imaginatio): [ „CRITA“ - Critical Reflection in Theater Arts – fits well with a project that uses philo theatre as a space for reflection] {Yes, I wanted Socrates to stay alive. I am wealthy and have a ship in the harbour of Athens´, Piraeus, ready to set sails to Abdera…} M: You have realised that the case of Socrates isn´t lost yet, CRITO/A! B {Jailer M, I have inquired and found out, that you did grow up there in the Northern end of Hellas with a regular ship connection to Attica} M: Protagoras uses this comfortable means of transport. My father was in your business, CRITO/A, and also a citizen of Athens. My mom is much younger and still alive in Abdera, living in a house with enough good ground, close to the harbour … B {And Abdera is used to having philosophers. Socrates could do philosophy with Democritus, who loves his polis like Socrates loves Athens. And he is curious with respect to different perspectives and enjoys the rural „cucina povera“ and peace of mind …} M: The problem is me, the jailer? Oh Crita! I have let you in (taking a handout). Socrates is still asleep. How calmly he dreams over there! I also think of saving this brave man´s life. B {You got the keys. I´ve got the fast sailing ship. Be my guests of honour -together with your present victim- crossing the Aegean waters for another phase in life!} (B is walking over to sit close to the sleeping Socrates) Alternative Scene 2 K is zooming , having in fokus the face of the sleeping Socrates. L (surprised to see CRITA & {M´s imaginatio}: {How come I find you here with me in jail?} B (with affection): {How amazingly calm you have slept! I have come quite early. The streets are empty at the end of the night. Come with us!} L (starting to philosophise): {The unexamined life, is it worth living?} B (diplomatic): {Let us symphilosophein walking in the fresh air into the beginning of this day. The jailer will let us out like he has let me in.} Alternative Scene 3 C (on what could have happened, B + L + M+K sailing away to Abdera): M (to C): Yes, counterfactual history please! Let’s imagine a world where Socrates, instead of drinking the hemlock, escapes his sentencing in Athens and heads north to Abdera—a city of thinkers, nestled by the Thracian coast close to the river Nestos. Arrival in Abdera: Exile of the Philosopher After fleeing Athens, Socrates arrives in Abdera. The city, though politically diminished, is intellectually alive thanks to the school of Democritus, who had returned from his own travels to his polis since many a year. Though they had divergent views they greet each other with curiosity, not rivalry. Clash and Convergence: Socrates Meets the Atomists Abdera becomes a microcosm of philosophical tension: Democritus argues that everything is made of indivisible atoms and void. Socrates, ever the gadfly, asks whether justice, beauty, and virtue can be reduced to atoms. Their dialogues—now lost to history in this imagined world—become legendary. Students flock from nearby regions, forming informal schools in the agora and by the Agaean coast, where the old philosophers come to see them every now and then. M: Abdera became a part of Macedonia around 350 BC, Philip II of Macedon—father of Alexander the Great—conquered Abdera as part of his expansion. Aristotle might have come to Abdera searching manuscripts of what he called the pre-Socratics. Among them Democritus (10 years younger than Socrates). Also today a good place to visit, have a stroll and a swim! References (1) Roth, Mike. ICPP2016, published 2018. PhiloDrama / „Talking Pictures“ – Ending Life with Socrates. In: Staude / Ruschmann (eds.). Understanding the Other and Oneself, 58-66. Cambridge Scholars. Newcastle GB (2) Roth, Mike. PhiloDrama 2023. Konstanzer Online-Publikations-System (KOPS) URL: http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bsz:352-2-1aez7do44jls9 (3) Roth & Hein (eds.), 2020 Philosophize ! eBook presented at a workshop in ICPP2020; https://www.amazon.de/Philosophize-Congress-Philosophical-Practice-English-ebook/dp/B08D8KBRDV/ and Philosophical Practice READER. Contribution to the 16. ICPP online. „Philo Ritual“ by Albert Hoffmann (4) Roth, V.M. (ed.) 2024 WO ER IST. Abdera 147 (5) The video that has been made by Karl Duelli & is published (without cuts) in the Konstanz University repository KONdata under philodrama Socrates Zagreb 2025 (6) Impro philodrama ICPP2025 openair I would have liked to do it as announced. But philosophical practice sometimes has to cope with surprise. Looking forward to philodrama again in June 2027 at the 19th ICPP ! XAIPETE Mike

philodrama SOCRATES apology ICPP2025

see philodrama Socrates Zagreb 2025 KONdata Mike Roth