The Passions in Roman Thought and Literature

Essays by an international team of scholars in Latin literature and ancient philosophy explore the understanding of emotions (or ‘passions’) in Roman thought and literature. Building on work on Hellenistic theories of emotion and on philosophy as therapy, they look closely at the interface between ancient philosophy (especially Stoic and Epicurean), rhetorical theory, conventional Roman thinking and literary portrayal. There are searching studies of the emotional thought-world of a range of writers including Catullus, Cicero, Virgil, Seneca, Statius, Tacitus and Juvenal. Issues of debate such as the ethical colour of Aeneas’s angry killing of Turnus at the end of the Aeneid are placed in a broad and illuminating perspective. Written in clear and non-technical language, with Greek and Latin translated, the volume opens up a fascinating area on the borders of philosophy and literature.

• Close study of the interface between ancient theory and literary presentation of emotions • Wide range of Latin authors, including the leading scholars in Latin literature and thought • Accessible and with all quotations translated

Preface; Conventions; Introduction: about this volume Susanna Morton Braund and Christopher Gill; Introduction: the emotions in Greco-Roman philosophy Christopher Gill; 1. Epicurean anger D. P. Fowler; 2. Cicero and the expression of grief Andrew Erskine; 3. The subjugaton of grief in Seneca’s Epistles Marcus Wilson; 4. A passion unconsoled? Grief and anger in Juvenal Satire 13 Susanna Morton Braund; 5. Passion, reason and knowledge in Seneca’s tragedies Alessandro Schiesaro; 6. Imagination and the arousal of the emotions in Greco-Roman rhetoric Ruth Webb; 7. Pity, fear and the historical audience: Tacitus on the fall of Vitellius D. S. Levene; 8. All in the mind: sickness in Catullus 76 Joan Booth; 9. Ferox uirtus: anger in Virgil’s Aeneid M. R. Wright; 10. ‘Envy and fear the begetter of hate’: Statius’ Thebaid and the genesis of hatred Elaine Fantham; 11. Passion as madness in Roman poetry Christopher Gill; Bibliography; Index of ancient passages; General index.