Can You Please Explain Plato’s Theory of Forms in Simple Terms?

I teach community college English and sometimes have occasion to refer to Plato’s Forms in critical thinking classes. Recently someone asked me if I could explain the theory of Forms in simple terms. Somehow it reminded me of some on-screen remarks I once heard Yankee Great Mickey Mantle make.

He remembered he was sitting next to rival slugger Ted Williams at an all-star game in which they were both playing when the famously studious and analytical Williams asked him how he held his bottom hand when hitting from the left side. Mantle said he looked down at his hands and tried to envision a bat there. Then he took a couple of phantom swings and said, “Hell, I don’t know; I never thought about it.” Mantle then laughed and said he went 0 for 20 after that.

It had never occurred to Mantle that there was some way to hold a bat that could be described or taught. And oddly, it had never occurred to me that there were some simple words that could be used to explain Plato’s Forms.

Plato is the most read, cited, and studied writer of philosophy who ever lived, and there are simple reasons for that: his texts have been around for more than two thousand years, and he is very good at writing philosophy.