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In the 40s BCE, during his forced retirement from politics under Caesar's dictatorship, Cicero turned to philosophy, producing a massive and important body of work. As he was acutely aware, this was an unusual undertaking for a Roman statesman because Romans were often hostile to philosophy, perceiving it as foreign and incompatible with fulfilling one's duty as a citizen. How, then, are we to understand Cicero's decision to pursue philosophy in the context of the political, intellectual, and cultural life of the late Roman republic? In A Written Republic, Yelena Baraz takes up this question and makes the case that philosophy for Cicero was not a retreat from politics but a continuation of politics by other means, an alternative way of living a political life and serving the state under newly restricted conditions.
Baraz examines the rhetorical battle that Cicero stages in his philosophical prefaces--a battle between the forces that would oppose or support his project. He presents his philosophy as intimately connected to the new political circumstances and his exclusion from politics. His goal--to benefit the state by providing new moral resources for the Roman elite--was traditional, even if his method of translating Greek philosophical knowledge into Latin and combining Greek sources with Roman heritage was unorthodox.
A Written Republic provides a new perspective on Cicero's conception of his philosophical project while also adding to the broader picture of late-Roman political, intellectual, and cultural life.
Acknowledgments ix
Abbreviations and Translations xi
Introduction 1
Chapter One: Otiose Otium: The Status of Intellectual Activity in Late
Republican Prefaces 13
Cicero's Ennius, or Anxiety about Too Much Philosophy 15
Sallust, or Anxiety about Writing 22
Rhetorica ad Herennium, or Anxiety about Status 36
Chapter Two: On a More Personal Note: Philosophy in the Letters 44
Philosophy as a Basis for Action 46
Philosophy and Politics 67
Writing as a Primary Occupation 78
The Consolation of Philosophy 86
Chapter Three: The Gift of Philosophy: The Treatises as Translations 96
The Shape of Translation: Tusculans I 103
Why Translation? De Finibus I 113
Chapter Four: With the Same Voice: Oratory as a Transitional Space 128
The Philosophizing Orator: A Stoic or an Academic? Cato versus Cicero in the Paradoxa Stoicorum 131
Always Philosophizing: Cicero as the Linchpin in De Natura Deorum I 137
From Oratory to Philosophy: The Logic of Tusculan Disputations I 140
Chapter Five: Reading a Ciceronian Preface: Strategies of Reader Management 150
Making Friends with Strangers: Topica 156
Drawing Strength from Tradition: De Senectute 173
Chapter Six: Philosophy after Caesar: The New Direction 187
Looking Back: De Divinatione II 188
From the Ides to the De Officiis 194
From Quintus the Elder to Marcus the Younger: The Pattern of Dedications 204
The Final Encounter: De Officiis 212
Bibliography 225
Index Locorum 243
General Index 249
Overview
In the 40s BCE, during his forced retirement from politics under Caesar's dictatorship, Cicero turned to philosophy, producing a massive and important body of work. As he was acutely aware, this was an unusual undertaking for a Roman statesman because Romans were often hostile to philosophy, perceiving it as foreign and incompatible with fulfilling one's duty as a citizen. How, then, are we to understand Cicero's decision to pursue philosophy in the context of the political, intellectual, and cultural life of the...