Its not the Platonic cleverness which makes me fond of Socrates, its the character behind it. Though all of what we may glean of even that is channelled through Plato's authorship, (this is understood).

Socrates' courage and consistency in the face of death, his calm concern rather for his friends than for himself; Boethius is another example of the same.

And wherein is the genesis of Socratic beauty or cleverness - is it the Socratic-Plato that is the beautiful soul, and the Platonic-Socrates that is diligently clever?

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"A man's work is nothing but this slow trek to rediscover, through the detours of art, those two or three great and simple images in whose presence his heart first opened."