Like Doctor Johnson, Socrates had a Boswell—Plato. That was not the only disadvantage under which Socrates had to labor. Imagine our having Boswell’s Life of Johnson (1791) without any of Samuel Johnson’s works. Then imagine not one but two Boswells. In Socrates’ case, the second was Xenophon, the Athenian soldier and author who wrote two dialogues in which Socrates figures as the chief speaker.
