Athens, 399 BCE. A prison cell in the fading light of evening. Socrates sits surrounded by friends. By sundown he must drink the hemlock. Before his weeping companions, the seventy-year-old philosopher begins his final conversation — calmly, almost cheerfully. The subject: does the soul survive death?
The Phaedo is among the most dramatic of Plato's middle-period dialogues. Philosophical argument and emotional tension interweave as four successive proofs are presented, challenged, and rebuilt. The reader follows the arguments while simultaneously witnessing a man walking toward his own death.
Reading this work is, in a sense, closer to an experience than to study. Behind the measured reasoning, time is running out — Socrates' life ends at sunset. Between the arguments we glimpse the tears of friends, Socrates' quiet smile, the guard preparing the poison. These emotional details transform the philosophical discussion from a mere intellectual puzzle into a question rooted in human existence.
Why read the Phaedo today? Modern science seeks to explain consciousness as a function of the brain, yet the question "what happens when we die?" still lies beyond the reach of science. Most of Socrates' arguments no longer convince on their own terms. But the attitude of facing death without abandoning reason — what Socrates in the dialogue calls a warning against "misology" (hatred of argument) — is the spirit of philosophy itself, timeless in its relevance.
This article follows the progression of the dialogue scene by scene, unpacking the content and structure of each argument. Concrete examples keep the discussion accessible to non-specialists, while preserving the intellectual excitement of the original — the thrill of an argument collapsing and being rebuilt from stronger foundations.
Key Takeaways
- Philosophy is the practice of dying: Socrates argues that the true philosopher spends a lifetime separating the soul from the body, and that death is the completion of this process. A philosopher who fears death is a contradiction — this provocative thesis sets the dialogue in motion.
- Four arguments and the dialectic of refutation: The Argument from Opposites, the Theory of Recollection, the Argument from Affinity, and the Final Argument from Forms. Each approaches the soul's immortality from a different angle, deepening through criticism. The philosophical value lies less in whether the arguments succeed than in the process of forging logic through dialogue.
- The prototype of the Theory of Forms: The Phaedo is one of the first dialogues to give the Theory of Forms an explicit formulation. Metaphysical entities like "Equality itself" and "Beauty itself" are developed as the foundation for the immortality of the soul.
About the Work
Contents Map
- Frame narrative introduction (57a–59c): Phaedo begins recounting Socrates' last day to Echecrates
- The prison scene (59c–61c): The final morning; Xanthippe's departure and the start of the conversation
- Philosophy as the practice of dying (61c–69e): The philosopher's attitude toward death
- First Argument: from Opposites (69e–72e): The cycle of life and death
- Second Argument: Recollection (72e–77a): Learning is remembering
- Third Argument: Affinity (77a–80d): The soul resembles the Forms
- Simmias and Cebes object (84c–88b): The lyre's attunement and the weaver's cloak
- The warning against misology and the intellectual autobiography (88b–102a): From natural philosophy to the Theory of Forms
- Fourth Argument: the Final Argument from Forms (102a–107b): The soul bears the Form of Life
- The myth of the afterlife and the final scene (107c–118a): The myth of the earth, the hemlock, the death of Socrates
Commentary Following the Original Table of Contents
1. The Frame Narrative (57a–59c)
The dialogue has a double frame. Echecrates, a Pythagorean philosopher from Elis, asks Phaedo to recount in detail what happened on the day of Socrates' execution. Phaedo names those who were present — and notably, Plato records his own absence: "Plato, I believe, was ill" (59b).
This "frame narrative" is a literary device worth pausing over. The nested structure — Phaedo reporting to Echecrates — gives the reader a sense of immediacy while simultaneously creating a distance: "this is a recollection by a witness." The technique is close to Conrad's Heart of Darkness, where Marlow narrates aboard a ship. The presence of a listener heightens both the credibility and the tension of the story.
Is Plato's note of his own absence an act of honesty or a literary maneuver? By writing that he was not there, he places a caveat on the report's accuracy while also gaining the creative freedom that comes with indirect narration.
With the frame established, the scene shifts to the interior of the prison.
2. The Prison Scene and the Pairing of Pleasure and Pain (59c–61c)
When his friends enter the prison, Socrates has just had his fetters removed. Rubbing his leg, he muses on the curious relationship between pleasure and pain: pain departs and pleasure arrives — the two never come together, yet pursuing one brings the other in its wake. Xanthippe, holding their infant son, cries out in grief and is led away. We also learn that Socrates has been writing verse in prison — turning Aesop's fables into poetry and composing a hymn to Apollo.
Two significant foreshadowings are embedded in this scene. The first is the inseparability of pleasure and pain (60b-c). The observation that relief follows suffering anticipates the core of the First Argument: opposites generate opposites. The second is the theme of mousikē (μουσική) — the arts in general. Socrates' claim that philosophy is "the greatest form of mousikē" (61a), and his turning to poetry even on the eve of death, reveals that the philosopher's calm is not indifference but deep fulfillment.
The conversation about pleasure and pain may look like small talk, but it is a structural anticipation of the Argument from Opposites that follows. Plato's compositional skill is on full display.
With the prologue in place, Cebes' question triggers the start of the proper philosophical discussion.
3. Philosophy as the Practice of Dying (61c–69e)
Cebes asks: if suicide is forbidden, why does Socrates welcome death? Socrates answers in two stages. First, human beings are the possessions of the gods, and it is not permitted to take one's own life without their consent (62b-c). Second, the philosopher has spent a lifetime separating the soul from the body. True knowledge cannot be gained through the senses; the body obstructs the soul's cognition. Therefore death — the complete separation of soul from body — is the fulfillment of what the philosopher has always sought (64a–67d).
Three central concepts emerge here. The first is the thesis that philosophy equals "the practice of dying" (μελέτη θανάτου, meletē thanatou). The second is the definition of death as "the separation of soul from body" (χωρισμός, chōrismos). The third is the claim that philosophy is a "purification" (κάθαρσις, katharsis) of the soul. To philosophize, then, is to free the soul a little each day from the body's constraints, and death is the completion — a kind of graduation. From a modern standpoint this sounds extreme, but what Socrates describes is the attitude of pursuing truth through thought alone rather than relying on the senses — something that resonates with academic inquiry to this day.
The argument contains a striking hostility toward the body. The senses deceive, desires cloud thinking, and even war originates in bodily appetite (66c-d). Modern readers may find this hard to accept — we come to know the world through the body and relate to others through it. When Nietzsche declared "the body is the great reason," his target was precisely this kind of body-denigration. Yet it is important to note that this passage represents one stage of a dialogue, not necessarily Plato's final position. In the later Timaeus, Plato accords the cosmic body a positive significance. The body-disparagement in the Phaedo is an argument forged under the extreme pressure of imminent death, and must be read strategically.
With these premises established, Cebes demands concrete proof. The first to be offered is the Argument from Opposites.
4. First Argument: from Opposites (69e–72e)
Cebes asks for grounds on which a philosopher need not fear death. Drawing on ancient doctrines, Socrates argues from a general law of nature: everything comes into being from its opposite. The larger arises from the smaller, the faster from the slower. Likewise, the living come from the dead and the dead from the living (70c–72a).
The argument can be laid out in steps: (1) Opposites arise from opposites. (2) "Being alive" and "being dead" are opposites. (3) Therefore the dead come from the living and the living from the dead. (4) If this cycle did not hold, everything would eventually remain in the state of death and life would vanish. Just as the seasons cycle from spring through summer, autumn, and winter, life and death must also revolve — that is the backbone of the proof.
The argument depends on a natural-philosophical premise. "Opposites arise from opposites" was a common assumption in ancient Greek natural philosophy, but its status as a universal law is weak. Moreover, there is a question whether change in qualities (larger/smaller) can be treated as equivalent to change in existence (life/death).
The First Argument rested on a natural-philosophical cycle. In the next, the perspective shifts to epistemology, and the seeds of the Theory of Forms appear.
5. Second Argument: Recollection (72e–77a)
Cebes introduces the Theory of Recollection (anamnēsis, ἀνάμνησις): to learn is to remember what the soul once knew. Socrates develops this. When we see two equal sticks, we recognize "Equality itself" (αὐτὸ τὸ ἴσον). But the equality we encounter through the senses is always imperfect — change the viewing angle and the sticks no longer look equal. Our ability to recognize this imperfection implies that we already know perfect Equality. This knowledge must have been acquired before birth; therefore the soul existed before the body (74a–76e).
What appears here for the first time in clear form is the concept of "Recollection" (ἀνάμνησις, anamnēsis) and the concrete example of a Form: "Equality itself." The argument matters because it draws attention to the fact that we know "perfect equality" even though we have never encountered it through the senses. Consider: no matter how precisely two rods are manufactured, at the atomic level they differ. Yet we can still judge them "equal." Socrates sees in this a source of knowledge beyond the senses — a memory the soul carried before birth.
Recollection proves the soul's pre-existence but does not directly prove its survival after death. Simmias points this out (77b-c), and it is only by combining the First and Second Arguments that one can conclude "the soul exists both before and after life." Whether the argument succeeds also depends on whether one accepts the existence of "Equality itself."
Having established the soul's pre-existence, Socrates now proceeds to an argument from the soul's nature — the distinction between the visible and the invisible.
6. Third Argument: Affinity (77a–80d)
Socrates divides existing things into two kinds: the visible and the invisible. The body is visible, changeable, and perishable. The Forms are invisible, immutable, and eternal. Which does the soul resemble? The soul is invisible and grasps unchanging truths through thought. Therefore the soul is akin to the invisible, immutable, and divine, and is unlikely to perish (78b–80c).
Strictly speaking, this is an analogy, and its force as proof is limited. "Resembling" something does not mean "being the same." A shadow "resembles" a person, but when the person departs, the shadow vanishes. Even if the soul "resembles" the Forms, that alone does not prove immortality. Socrates himself does not consider this argument sufficient, and it is immediately followed by powerful objections from Simmias and Cebes.
Here the dialogue reaches a major turning point. Having heard three arguments, Simmias and Cebes each mount a counterattack armed with vivid metaphors.
7. Simmias and Cebes Object (84c–88b)
Three arguments have been stacked up. The audience seems gradually persuaded. Then the dialogue takes a dramatic turn: two young philosophers strike back with dazzling analogies.
Simmias speaks first. Is the soul not like the "attunement" (ἁρμονία, harmonia) of a lyre? A lyre is made of wood and strings — physical things — but its attunement is invisible, beautiful, even seemingly divine. Yet if the lyre is smashed, the attunement vanishes. Likewise, when the body is destroyed, might the soul not simply cease to exist (85e–86d)? The analogy is strikingly modern. The brain is matter; consciousness is non-material — but if the brain shuts down, consciousness disappears. This is precisely the standard view of contemporary neuroscience.
Cebes' objection: the soul may outlast the body, but consider the "weaver and his cloaks." A weaver makes and wears out many cloaks in a lifetime, yet he dies leaving his last cloak behind. Similarly, the soul may use up several bodies before finally wearing out and perishing (87a–88b).
Simmias' objection anticipates modern epiphenomenalism — the view that consciousness is a by-product of brain function, and that when the brain stops, consciousness stops too. Cebes' objection is more fundamental in that it questions not the soul's eternity but its durability.
These two objections shake the listeners' confidence. Before returning to argument, Socrates first challenges the very attitude one should take toward reasoning.
8. The Warning Against Misology and the Intellectual Autobiography (88b–102a)
The two objections unsettle the audience. Phaedo recalls feeling as though everything they had established was suddenly overturned. Here Socrates issues a crucial warning: do not fall into "misology" — hatred of argument. To hate reasoning because an argument failed is the same error as hating all people because one person proved untrustworthy — the "misanthropy" that Socrates compares it to (89c–91c).
Socrates then refutes Simmias' "attunement theory." If the soul were a mere attunement, we could not distinguish good souls from bad ones (93a–94b). Moreover, the soul can oppose the body's desires — an attunement cannot oppose its instrument (94b-e). Furthermore, the Theory of Recollection and the attunement theory are incompatible: Recollection requires that the soul exist before the body, but an attunement can only come into being after the instrument (92a-c).
In response to Cebes, Socrates recounts his own intellectual history. In his youth he was drawn to Anaxagoras' natural philosophy and the promise that Nous (Mind) was the cause of the world, only to find that Anaxagoras actually explained everything in terms of material causes like air and water. Disappointed, Socrates turned to a "second sailing" (δεύτερος πλοῦς, 99d): instead of examining things directly, he would seek truth through logoi — through reasoned discourse. This was the path that led to the Theory of Forms (96a–100a).
Two concepts in this passage carry exceptional weight in the dialogue as a whole. One is "misology" (μισολογία) — losing trust in reasoning because reasoning once disappointed you. The other is the "second sailing" (δεύτερος πλοῦς) — the methodological turn from looking at things directly to approaching truth through discourse. The two concepts form a pair. Misology is a warning against "giving up on argument"; the "second sailing" is a proposal to "change how we argue." Do not abandon inquiry because it failed; set out again with a better method — this is the spirit of philosophy itself.
The warning against misology is perhaps the most important philosophical legacy of the entire dialogue. It is also self-referential: even if all four of the Phaedo's arguments fail, that is no reason to stop philosophizing. When an argument collapses, find a better one. The "second sailing" is precisely this methodological declaration. Rather than scorching one's eyes by staring directly at things, approach truth through the reflection of discourse — as one might observe an eclipse reflected in water (99d-e). This image is frequently cited as a turning point in the history of Western philosophical method.
With the objections answered and the foundations of the Theory of Forms secured, Socrates now advances to the most refined of the four arguments.
9. Fourth Argument: the Final Argument from Forms (102a–107b)
The most rigorous proof is now developed. First, a Form does not admit its opposite. "Largeness itself" never becomes small. Snow essentially bears the property of cold, and if heat approaches, it retreats or is destroyed. Likewise, the soul essentially bears the property of life. Death is the opposite of life. Therefore the soul cannot admit death — the soul is "immortal" (ἀθάνατον, athanaton) (105c–106d).
Laid out step by step: (1) A Form does not admit its opposite. (2) Whatever essentially bears a given Form also cannot admit that Form's opposite. (3) The soul essentially bears the Form of Life. (4) Death is the opposite of life. (5) Therefore the soul cannot admit death. (6) What cannot admit death (i.e., what is immortal) is imperishable. (7) Therefore the soul is imperishable. An elegant chain of syllogisms — but is the reasoning airtight?
The greatest weakness lies at step (6). Whether "immortal" necessarily means "imperishable" is not self-evident. Snow cannot admit heat, but it melts — it is destroyed. The soul, too, might "retreat" from death without being immune to destruction elsewhere. Cebes concedes the point while suggesting that if the immortal is not imperishable, then nothing is (106d).
The four arguments are now complete. Yet rather than closing the discussion, Socrates turns to the power of myth to express what argument alone cannot capture.
10. The Myth of the Afterlife and the Final Scene (107c–118a)
Once the arguments conclude, Socrates tells a grand myth (mythos) about the fate of the soul after death. The earth is an immense sphere, and we live in one of its hollows. On the true surface there lies a world of incomparable beauty. Souls that have lived justly ascend there; those purified by philosophy rise higher still (108c–114c).
Socrates adds a crucial caveat: "No sensible person would insist that these things are exactly as I have described them. But given that the soul is immortal, it seems to me fitting and worth the risk to believe that something of this kind is true" (114d). This remark deserves attention. Socrates is not telling the myth as literal truth. He is presenting it as a "wager" — uncertain yet worthy of belief. Here we see condensed the philosopher's stance: knowing the limits of argument yet refusing to surrender hope.
The dialogue moves toward its final scene. Socrates bathes in an inner room, speaks his last words to his three sons and two female relatives, then returns to his friends. The sun is already low. The guard approaches in tears: "You are the noblest, the gentlest, and the best man who has ever come to this place" (116c). Socrates nods calmly and takes the cup of hemlock.
His friends can bear it no longer. Apollodorus, who had been weeping throughout, breaks into loud sobs when Socrates drains the cup, and the whole company bursts into tears — all except Crito. Socrates rebukes them: "What is this strange behavior? I sent the women away precisely so that they would not act like this" (117d-e). Ashamed, his friends check their tears.
Socrates walks about as instructed, and when his legs grow heavy he lies down on his back. The guard pinches his foot and asks whether he can feel it. He cannot. The poison creeps upward from the feet. When it reaches the abdomen, Socrates draws back the cloth covering his face and speaks his last words: "Crito, we owe a cock to Asclepius. Make sure you pay the debt" (118a).
No sentence in ancient philosophy has provoked more interpretations. Asclepius was the god of medicine; offering a cock was customary upon recovering from illness. Nietzsche read a profound irony here — "Socrates regarded life as a disease" (The Gay Science, §340). If living is the illness and death its cure, then the calm serenity displayed throughout the dialogue is merely the flip side of a deep loathing of life. But most scholars favor other readings. Perhaps it was literally a small debt Socrates wanted settled; or perhaps it was gratitude that the "cure" of philosophy had been completed that day. Whatever the answer, it is telling that the dialogue ends not with a grand philosophical pronouncement or a sublime farewell but with this enigmatic piece of everyday business — and it is this very ordinariness that has captivated readers for 2,400 years.
Phaedo closes with these words: "Such was the end of our friend — a man who, we would say, was of all those we knew in our time the best, the wisest, and the most just" (118a). The dialogue falls silent.
The Core Concepts and the Skeleton of the Arguments
Each of the Phaedo's four arguments rests on a different premise:
- First Argument (from Opposites) — Natural-philosophical premise: change is cyclical
- Second Argument (Recollection) — Epistemological premise: innate knowledge exists
- Third Argument (Affinity) — Ontological analogy: the invisible is akin to the imperishable
- Fourth Argument (from Forms) — Metaphysical premise: a Form does not admit its opposite
None of the four is conclusive by modern standards. But what matters is the dialogue's structure: each time an objection is raised, a deeper theoretical foundation — culminating in the Theory of Forms — is required. Plato does not conceal the weaknesses; he turns them into the engine of the conversation. Philosophy is not about arriving at conclusions but about deepening the questions — and the Phaedo can be read as a demonstration of exactly this principle.
Major Interpretive Debates
1. Do the arguments succeed? From antiquity to the present, few scholars have maintained that any of the four arguments decisively proves the immortality of the soul. David Gallop (1975) carefully analyzes the weaknesses of each and argues that Plato himself may have been aware of them.
2. Did Plato genuinely believe? Before the myth, Socrates qualifies: "No sensible person would insist that these things are exactly as I have described" (114d). Some scholars take this to mean that Plato is not asserting the soul's immortality as a conviction but performing a philosophical inquiry.
3. The problem of body-denigration: Defining philosophy as "liberation from the body" has drawn strong criticism from Nietzsche and feminist philosophers. Yet in later dialogues such as the Timaeus, Plato's view of the body becomes more positive; the Phaedo's stance should not be taken as Plato's final word.
4. The Pythagorean connection: Simmias and Cebes are students of the Theban Pythagorean Philolaus. Themes of reincarnation and purification reflect strong Pythagorean influence, and the boundary between the historical Socrates and Plato's own thought remains debated.
The Work's Legacy
Antiquity: Aristotle directly criticized the Theory of Forms as presented in the Phaedo (Metaphysics, Book A), arguing above all that "separated Forms cannot be the cause of particulars" — a critique that strikes at the premise of the Fourth Argument. The Neoplatonist Plotinus inherited and developed the themes of the soul's immortality and purification; Enneads IV.7 ("On the Immortality of the Soul") reconstructs the Phaedo's arguments. In late antiquity, Olympiodorus wrote a detailed commentary that was transmitted through the Byzantine world to posterity.
Christian theology: The early Church Fathers linked the Phaedo's doctrine of the soul's immortality with the scriptural faith in resurrection. Augustine incorporated Platonic soul-theory into a Christian framework. However, there is a fundamental tension between the biblical "resurrection of the body" and the Platonic "liberation from the body." In the Summa Theologiae, Thomas Aquinas drew on Platonic arguments for the soul's immortality while correcting them through Aristotle's hylomorphic theory.
The modern era: Descartes' mind–body dualism can be read as a modern version of the Phaedo's separation of soul and body. Kant denied that the soul's immortality could be proved by theoretical reason while preserving it as a "postulate" of practical reason — in the "Paralogisms" chapter of the Critique of Pure Reason, the very type of argument found in the Phaedo is subjected to critique. In contemporary philosophy of mind, Simmias' "attunement theory" and its refutation are noted as precursors to the debate over functionalism and mental causation.
Connections to the Present
First, the "hard problem" of consciousness. Neuroscience is mapping correlations between neural activity and conscious experience, but the question of why subjective experience arises from physical processes at all remains unsolved. The debate over Simmias' "attunement theory" bears directly on the modern question of whether consciousness can be reduced to brain function.
Second, philosophy in the face of death. In hospice and end-of-life care, the question of how to face death without fear is urgent. Socrates' attitude cannot be transplanted wholesale into modern life, but the stance of facing death without abandoning reason remains a reference point.
Third, resisting the hatred of argument. In an age of social-media polarization, the temptation to abandon dialogue altogether is widespread. "Nothing I say will make a difference"; "Debate is a waste of time" — these feelings are precisely the "misology" Socrates warned against. Encountering bad arguments is no reason to hate argument itself. The problem lies not in argument but in how we argue — this may be the most urgent lesson of the Phaedo for the present day.
Fourth, what is a "soul" in the age of AI? Today, large language models "think" and "speak" in human-like ways, lending new urgency to the question of what consciousness and intelligence really are. If AI can behave intelligently without a soul, on what grounds do we assert the uniqueness of human beings? Simmias' "attunement theory" — consciousness is merely an epiphenomenon arising from a material configuration — may resonate most sharply in the age of AI.
Questions for the Reader
- None of the Phaedo's four arguments is conclusive — and yet Socrates faced death serenely. Can believing something be "a good wager" even when the proof is incomplete?
- If consciousness is nothing more than a brain function, then "I" do not exist once the brain stops. Is Simmias' analogy of the lyre's attunement correct? If it is, how should we face the fear of death?
- Have you ever felt that "arguing is pointless"? Would Socrates' warning against misology help at such a moment?
- If you were to die tonight, what would you want to talk about? Would you choose philosophy, like Socrates — or something else entirely?
Key Quotes (with Sources)
"οἱ ὀρθῶς φιλοσοφοῦντες ἀποθνῄσκειν μελετῶσι" Source: Phaedo 67e. "Those who practice philosophy aright are practicing dying." The single sentence that most succinctly captures the thesis that philosophy is the practice of death. / Original: "οἱ ὀρθῶς φιλοσοφοῦντες ἀποθνῄσκειν μελετῶσι"
"μὴ μισολόγοι γενώμεθα [...] ὥσπερ οἱ μισάνθρωποι γιγνόμενοι" Source: Phaedo 89d. "Let us not become haters of argument, as some become haters of humanity." A warning never to abandon trust in reasoning. / Original: "μὴ μισολόγοι γενώμεθα [...] ὥσπερ οἱ μισάνθρωποι γιγνόμενοι"
"ὦ Κρίτων, τῷ Ἀσκληπιῷ ὀφείλομεν ἀλεκτρυόνα· ἀλλὰ ἀπόδοτε καὶ μὴ ἀμελήσητε." Source: Phaedo 118a. "Crito, we owe a cock to Asclepius. Pay the debt and do not neglect it." Socrates' last words. / Original: "ὦ Κρίτων, τῷ Ἀσκληπιῷ ὀφείλομεν ἀλεκτρυόνα· ἀλλὰ ἀπόδοτε καὶ μὴ ἀμελήσητε."
"ἥδε ἡ τελευτὴ [...] τοῦ ἑταίρου ἡμῖν ἐγένετο, ἀνδρός, ὡς ἡμεῖς φαῖμεν ἄν, τῶν τότε ὧν ἐπειράθημεν ἀρίστου καὶ ἄλλως φρονιμωτάτου καὶ δικαιοτάτου." Source: Phaedo 118a. "Such was the end of our friend — the best, the wisest, and the most just of all the men of his time whom we have known." The closing words of the dialogue. / Original: "ἥδε ἡ τελευτὴ [...] τοῦ ἑταίρου ἡμῖν ἐγένετο, ἀνδρός, ὡς ἡμεῖς φαῖμεν ἄν, τῶν τότε ὧν ἐπειράθημεν ἀρίστου καὶ ἄλλως φρονιμωτάτου καὶ δικαιοτάτου."
References
- (Primary text): Plato, Phaedo, in Platonis Opera, ed. J. Burnet, Oxford Classical Texts, vol. I, 1900. (Stephanus 57a–118a)
- (Translation / commentary): Gallop, David. Plato: Phaedo. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1975. — A standard translation with detailed philosophical notes.
- (Translation): Grube, G.M.A. Phaedo. 2nd ed. Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing, 1977. — Widely used classroom translation.
- (Scholarly study): Bostock, David. Plato's Phaedo. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1986. — Focuses on the logical structure of the arguments.
- (Greek text + translation/commentary): Rowe, C.J. Plato: Phaedo. Cambridge Greek and Latin Classics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993. — Greek text with translation and commentary.
- (Web): Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy, "Plato: Phaedo" (Tim Connolly). https://iep.utm.edu/phaedo/
