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SENECAN ‘META-STOICALITY’: IN THE COGNITIVE GRASP OF ATREUS
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 19 December 2018
Extract
The first act of Thyestes is a challenge to the theory that the same Seneca wrote both the philosophica and the tragedies. We are compelled by the evil genius of Atreus and not by the common virtue of his Satelles. Atreus not only feels no compunction at his words, but seems to hone his evil from the prodding. It is the death of philosophy, the anti-mirror of the prince: the tyrant is not reformed, but becomes more himself—more perfectly tyrannical. It is a performance of Socrates’ monster in Republic 9—the soul composed of a hydra of desires with its ring of heads constantly changing, a lion of anger and a small man, who is to domesticate the hydra like a farmer and befriend the lion (588c–589b). The ineffectual Satelles portrays the hopeless plight of Plato's ‘little man reason’ before a lion with monstrous desires like Atreus. There is a place left for philosophy to win over the tyrant only if the Satelles does not represent all that reason can do, and stands instead only for gentlemanly virtue or common sense, which lacks the kind of logos needed to control the beast.
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Footnotes
A Classical essay in memory of Roger Hornsby (University of Iowa), the best teacher and friend.
References
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12 Tarrant (n. 5), on line 642 suggests Palatine aspects of the description; cf. Rimell, V., The Closure of Space in Roman Poetics (Cambridge, 2015), 130–6CrossRefGoogle Scholar, 181 n. 53; for a further bibliography, see Torre, C., ‘Thyestes’, in Damschen, G. and Heil, A. (edd.), Brill's Companion to Seneca: Philosopher and Dramatist (Leiden, 2014), 501–11Google Scholar, at 508–9.
13 Fin. 3.62 (SVF 3.340, LS 57F); cf. Fin. 5.23, discussed by L. Abrahamsen, The Tragedy of Identity in Senecan Drama (Diss., Bryn Mawr, 1993), 14–15.
14 Cf. De Otio 4.1.
15 Abrahamsen (n. 13), 15 says that oikeiōsis is ‘turned upside down’ in Senecan tragedy, and relationships in Thyestes show an ‘inversion of expectation’ (58), but she discusses the play primarily in terms of ‘identity’, and sees a ‘failure of oikeiōsis’ (61), rather than a manipulation of oikeiōsis imagery. She reacts (16) to Henry, D., The Mask of Power. Seneca's Tragedies and Imperial Rome (Chicago, 1985), 92–115Google Scholar, at 100, who also examines identity, and sees the ‘manic ambition’ of characters such as Atreus as a ‘parody of oikeiosis’.
16 Tarrant (n. 5), 24; Tarrant, R.J., ‘Seeing Seneca whole?’, in Volk, K. and Williams, G.D. (edd.), Seeing Seneca Whole: Perspectives on Philosophy, Poetry, and Politics (Leiden, 2006), 1–17Google Scholar, at 12, where he compares Thy. 703–4; Morford, M., ‘Walking tall: the final entrance of Atreus in Seneca's Thyestes’, Syllecta Classica 11 (2000), 162–77CrossRefGoogle Scholar, at 169; Mader, G., ‘The rhetoric of rationality and irrationality’, in Damschen, G. and Heil, A. (edd.), Brill's Companion to Seneca: Philosopher and Dramatist (Leiden, 2014), 574–92Google Scholar, at 591–2. Knoche, U., ‘Senecas Atreus’, in Lefèvre, E., Senecas Tragödien (Darmstadt, 1972), 477–89Google Scholar, at 479–80; Seidensticker, B., ‘Maius solito. Senecas Thyestes und die tragoedia rhetorica’, A&A 31 (1985), 116–36Google Scholar, at 131. For relevant passages in the philosophica, see Armisen-Marchetti, M., ‘Seneca's images and metaphors’, in Bartsch, S. and Schiesaro, A. (edd.), The Cambridge Companion to Seneca (Cambridge, 2015), 150–60CrossRefGoogle Scholar, at 154.
17 Thy. 885–919 and Morford (n. 16), 163, 171; Volk, K., ‘Cosmic disruption in Seneca's Thyestes: two ways of looking at an eclipse’, in Volk, K. and Williams, G.D. (edd.), Seeing Seneca Whole: Perspectives on Philosophy, Poetry, and Politics (Leiden, 2006), 183–200Google Scholar, at 195. Jupiter is identified with the good in Stoicism (LS 60I). See also Sen. Ep. 124.
18 Scenes where villains search for the perfectly ambiguous phrase both to conceal and to reveal their intentions are common in Senecan tragedy, and lay the foundation of dramatic irony. Star, C. examines self-address in ‘Commanding constantia in Senecan tragedy’, TAPhA 136 (2006), 207–44Google Scholar. In Agamemnon, Clytemestra rouses herself to daring (108–24) much as Atreus does here, and in a dialogue with her Nurse, formulates perfect turns of phrase to conceal whether she intends suicide or murder, cui ultima est fortuna, quid dubiam timet (146). The audience knows it will be murder, but the Nurse assumes that Clytemestra feels guilty about her years of adultery with Aegisthus, and thinks that she is talking about killing herself for another sixty lines. Tarrant (n. 5), 116 also compares Phaedra and her Nurse (Phae. 85–273) and Medea and her Nurse (Med. 115–78, 382–430).
19 Diog. Laert. 7.46 (LS 41C, SVF 2.53); Wildberger, J., ‘Seneca and the Stoic theory of cognition’, in Volk, K. and Williams, G.D. (edd.), Seeing Seneca Whole: Perspectives on Philosophy, Poetry, and Politics (Leiden, 2006), 75–102Google Scholar, at 91 n. 39 argues that Seneca does not discuss the doctrine in the philosophica, but shows that he is aware of it in passages such as Ep. 87.33. Seneca treats all Stoic doctrine in this way; his letters are always directed to praxis. Seneca questions his actions rather than his senses, as the Sextians do (De ira 3.36). Katalepsis lies behind his ‘vivid’ exempla, and ‘digesting’ ideas and the uera imago in Ep. 84.3–8.
20 Epict. Diss. 1.6.10; Staley (n. 9), 56–60; Imbert, C., ‘Stoic logic and Alexandrian poetics’, in Barnes, J., Nussbaum, M. and Brunschwig, J. (edd.), Doubt and Dogmatism: Studies in Hellenistic Epistemology (Oxford, 1980), 182–216Google Scholar.
21 Diog. Laert. 7.49 (LS 33D, SVF 2.52) ὃ πάσχει ὑπὸ τῆς φαντασίας, τοῦτο ἐκφέρει λόγῳ. Sext. Emp. Math. 8.70 (LS 33C, SVF 2.187): λεκτὸν δὲ ὑπάρχειν φασὶ τὸ κατὰ λογικὴν φαντασίαν ὑφιστάμενον, λογικὴν δὲ εἶναι φαντασίαν καθ’ ἣν τὸ φαντασθὲν ἔστι λόγῳ παραστῆσαι.
22 Abrahamsen (n. 13), 61 compares 1097–8.
23 It is unclear whether the appetite is the monster or that by eating parts of his own children Thyestes becomes a physical monster (an assemblage of parts from different creatures; cf. Verg. Aen. 8.483–8; Caes. BGall. 6.16); Lynd (n. 1), 53.
24 An oxymoron familiar from Aen. 1.464, 12.473–80.
25 Cic. Diu. 1.118 (LS 42E, SVF 2.1210) ut certis rebus certa signa praecurrerent, alia in extis … ea quibus bene percepta sunt, ei non saepe falluntur; male coniecta maleque interpretata falsa sunt non rerum uitio, sed interpretum inscientia. A. Busch discusses Seneca's view of divination from QNat. 2.32.3–5 in ‘Versane natura est? Natural and linguistic instability in the extispicium and self-blinding of Seneca's Oedipus’, CJ 102 (2007), 225–67Google Scholar, at 227.
26 οἱ Στωικοὶ εἱρμὸν αἰτιῶν, τουτέστι τάξιν καὶ ἐπισύνδεσιν ἀπαράβατον (Aetius 1.28.4: LS 55J, SVF 2.917). Instead of ‘binding together’ as of links in a chain (ἐπισύνδεσιν), Gellius reports Stoic imagery of fate as a ‘weaving’ (ἐπιπλοκή, NA 7.2.3: LS 55K, SVF 2.1000, drawing on the traditional myth of Clotho, Lachesis and Atropos). Chrysippus identifies εἱμαρμένη with the ‘reason of the cosmos’, ὁ τοῦ κόσμου λόγος (Stob. Ecl. 1.79.1–12: LS 55M, SVF 2.913). Davis, P.J., ‘Fate and human responsibility in Seneca's Oedipus’, Latomus 50 (1991), 150–63Google Scholar, at 151 notes that Seneca calls it series implexa causarum (Ben. 4.7.2) and necessitatem rerum omnium actionumque, quam nulla uis rumpat (QNat. 2.36.1).
27 Sen. QNat. 2.38; Cic. Fat. 30 (LS 55S, SVF 2.956).
28 Cic. Fat. 39–43 (LS 62C, SVF 2.974).
29 Cic. Fat. 42 (LS 62C, SVF 2.974) sed [Chrysippus] reuertitur ad cylindrum et ad turbinem suum: quae moueri incipere nisi pulsa non possunt; id autem cum accidit, suapte natura quod superest et cylindrum uolui et uersari turbinem putat.
30 Hippol. Haer. 1.21 (LS 62A, SVF 2.975); cf. Fischer (n. 5), 764 on Sen. De uita beata 15.7. Motto, A.L. and Clark, J.R., ‘Violenta fata: the tenor of Seneca's Oedipus’, CB 50 (1974), 81–7Google Scholar, at 85 suggest that Oedipus is an exemplum of the Stoic image and quote Seneca's verse translation of Cleanthes’ saying, ‘fate leads the willing, and drags the unwilling’, ducunt uolentem fata, nolentem trahunt (Ep. 107.11); see also Henry (n. 15), 95.
31 Epict. Diss. 2.6.10 (LS 58J, SVF 3.191).
32 Cf. Busch (n. 25), 252.
33 Pratt, N. discusses the troubled critical reception of this scene in Dramatic Suspense in Seneca and in his Greek Predecessors (Princeton, 1939), 96–9Google Scholar. Seneca may have in mind a famous passage in Cicero of how Caesar once examined a victim that had no heart, an impossibility illustrating the Stoic claim that the gods intervene in divination (Diu. 2.36).
34 Seneca uses circulo and gyrum of the periods of life in Ep. 12.6; see Rimell (n. 12), 118–19.
35 See also Pratt (n. 33), 96; similarly, nature is described as uersa est at 371.
36 Stevens, J., ‘Etymology and plot in Senecan tragedy’, Syllecta Classica 13 (2002), 126–53CrossRefGoogle Scholar, at 141–3, as if ambigua noscere suggests οἶδα δίποδα, rather than the usual οἰδέω-πούς, ‘swollen-foot’.
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39 Davis (n. 26), 157–61 and Busch (n. 25), 249–65 discuss the reversal and ‘transgression’ of nature. Seneca also plays upon the ‘car’ of Laius to allude to the Stoic ‘cart’ (764–83).
40 Cic. Fin. 3.60–1 (LS 66G, SVF 3.763); cf. Sen. Ep. 30.1–2, 58.36, 70.5.
41 Plut. Comm. not. 1069E (LS 59A, SVF 3.491); cf. Sen. Ep. 94.18–19.
42 Diog. Laert. 7.85–6 (LS 57A, SVF 3.178).
43 Stob. Ecl. 2.82.20–1 (LS 58C, SVF 3.142).
44 Stob. Ecl. 2.72.19–25 (SVF 3.88); Diog. Laert. 7.102 (LS 58A, SVF 3.117); Sen. Ep. 117.5.
45 Stob. Ecl. 2.79.1–17 (SVF 3.118).
46 Croisille (n. 6), 285 says that the ‘pursuit of nature’ hardly makes Hippolytus ‘the mouthpiece of the Stoic philosopher advocating the simple, natural life’, as argued by Marti (n. 6), 232.
47 On the absolute centrality of nature to the play, see Boyle, A.J., ‘In nature's bonds: a study of Seneca's Phaedra’, ANRW 2.32.2 (1985), 1284–347Google Scholar, at 1289–304. Henry, D. and Walker, B., ‘Phantasmagoria and idyll: an element of Seneca's Phaedra’, G&R 13 (1966), 223–39Google Scholar, at 233 note the Nurse's recommendation: uitae sequere naturam ducem (481). The Nurse alludes to Stoic ‘duties’ (καθήκοντα): propria descripsit deus | officia et aeuum per suos duxit gradus (451–2).
48 When Hippolytus reprises his imagery of ‘filling the void’ with Phaedra, she swoons: ac tibi parentis ipse supplebo locum, 633.
49 Leeman, A.D., ‘Seneca's Phaedra as a Stoic tragedy’, in Bremer, J.M., Radt, S.L. and Ruijgh, C.J. (edd.), Miscellanea Tragica in Honorem J.C. Kamerbeek (Amsterdam, 1976), 199–212Google Scholar, at 209 notes the ironies of Hippolytus’ ‘blind adherence to the honestum’.
50 Leeman (n. 49), 203–4 discusses the central role of hunting imagery. Henry and Walker (n. 47), 231 comment on Seneca's cluster of pursuit and avoidance language at Phae. 91, 178–9, 230, 235 and 253.
51 Fitch, J.G. and McElduff, S., ‘Construction of the self in Senecan drama’, Mnemosyne 55 (2002), 18–40CrossRefGoogle Scholar, at 32–6 discuss the relation between Phaedra's desire and her performance of roles such as the chaste noblewoman of good repute.
52 Henry and Walker (n. 47), 231 and 238 note Phaedra's ambiguity about uirum.
53 Tac. Ann. 14.52.3: obiciebant etiam eloquentiae laudem uni sibi adsciscere et carmina crebrius factitare, postquam Neroni amor eorum uenisset.
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56 Strabo 1.2.5, ἡ δὲ ῥητορικὴ φρόνησίς ἐστι δὴπου περὶ λόγους·
57 Strabo 1.2.8, φιλειδήμων γὰρ ἄνθρωπος· προοίμιον δὲ τούτου τὸ φιλόμυθον.
58 Strabo 1.2.8; cf. Verg. Ecl. 4.26–7.
59 Morford (n. 16), 174 ‘a moral desert’; Tarrant (n. 5), 46 citing caelum uacat (892).
60 Poe, J.P., ‘An analysis of Seneca's Thyestes’, TAPhA 100 (1969), 355–76Google Scholar, at 364–5; Littlewood, C.A.J., Self-Representation and Illusion in Senecan Tragedy (Oxford, 2004), 214CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Schiesaro (n. 9), 1, 253–4.
61 SVF 2.1071–4: Diog. Laert. 7.187; Clem. Al. Rom. Homil. 5.18; Theoph. Ad Autol. 3.8; Origen, C. Cels. 4.48.
62 Trinacty (n. 8), 36 lists other flawed examples.
63 Wray, D., ‘Seneca's shame’, in Bartsch, S. and Schiesaro, A. (edd.), The Cambridge Companion to Seneca (Cambridge, 2015), 199–211CrossRefGoogle Scholar, at 209 n. 24 cites De uita beata 17.3; see also the discussion of Inwood (n. 3), 283–301 on Sen. Ep. 120.
64 Marti (n. 6), 222: ‘Seneca systematically ordered the tragedies according to their principal theme and adopted an arrangement … more akin to a Stoic treatise than to a set of plays.’