/lit/ - Literature

Hijacking this thread: any anons here write Platonic dialogues? Not even for publication, but does anyone just use the dialogue format as a way of figuring out things?
if so how do you do it, do you just start free-writing a conversation, transcribing questions and answers. Just sort of improvise it.
Do you at least conceive of a dramatis personae, give them specific beliefs and then let them have at it? In that case do you use Socrates as a character? Yourself? Or does it change?
And most importantly - has this exercise helped you at all in your intellectual development? And what lessons have you learned about the exercise itself rather than the conclusions or theories you have drawn from it (i.e. what can you tell me about using dialogues better)?