Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of contributors
- Prologue
- 1 THE ORATOR AND THE READER: Manipulation and response in Cicero's Fifth Verrine
- 2 STRATAGEMS OF VANITY: Cicero, Ad familiares 5.12 and Pliny's letters
- 3 ‘SHALL I COMPARE THEE…?’: Catullus 68B and the limits of analogy
- 4 ATOMS AND ELEPHANTS: Lucretius 2.522–40
- 5 IN MEMORIAM GALLI: Propertius 1.21
- 6 THE POWER OF IMPLICATION: Horace's invitation to Maecenas (Odes 1.20)
- 7 THE VOICE OF VIRGIL: The pageant of Rome in Aeneid 6
- 8 FROM ORPHEUS TO ASS'S EARS: Ovid, Metamorphoses 10.1–11.193
- 9 POET AND AUDIENCE IN SENECAN TRAGEDY: Phaedra 358–430
- 10 PERSIUS' FIRST SATIRE: A re-examination
- 11 NERO'S ALIEN CAPITAL: Tacitus as paradoxographer (Annals 15.36–7)
- 12 AMOR CLERICALIS
- 13 EPILOGUE
- Notes
- Abbreviations and bibliography
- Indexes
2 - STRATAGEMS OF VANITY: Cicero, Ad familiares 5.12 and Pliny's letters
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 13 March 2010
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of contributors
- Prologue
- 1 THE ORATOR AND THE READER: Manipulation and response in Cicero's Fifth Verrine
- 2 STRATAGEMS OF VANITY: Cicero, Ad familiares 5.12 and Pliny's letters
- 3 ‘SHALL I COMPARE THEE…?’: Catullus 68B and the limits of analogy
- 4 ATOMS AND ELEPHANTS: Lucretius 2.522–40
- 5 IN MEMORIAM GALLI: Propertius 1.21
- 6 THE POWER OF IMPLICATION: Horace's invitation to Maecenas (Odes 1.20)
- 7 THE VOICE OF VIRGIL: The pageant of Rome in Aeneid 6
- 8 FROM ORPHEUS TO ASS'S EARS: Ovid, Metamorphoses 10.1–11.193
- 9 POET AND AUDIENCE IN SENECAN TRAGEDY: Phaedra 358–430
- 10 PERSIUS' FIRST SATIRE: A re-examination
- 11 NERO'S ALIEN CAPITAL: Tacitus as paradoxographer (Annals 15.36–7)
- 12 AMOR CLERICALIS
- 13 EPILOGUE
- Notes
- Abbreviations and bibliography
- Indexes
Summary
Behind David West's skills as a critic and translator lies an interest in the nuances of language. While it is more usual to study such nuances in poetry, the letters discussed below may remind anyone who needs reminding that in its rhetoric prose can be just as artful.
CICERO, AD FAMILIARES 5.12
Dear Lucceius,
I see you have almost finished your account of the War of the Allies and the struggle between Marius and Sulla, and that you are now preparing for the next phase of your work. As I am passionately eager for fame (not just in the future but also now in my lifetime), I am writing to ask if you would be kind enough to ignore considerations of chronology and to pass at once to those events in which I played such a central role. May I suggest, in fact, a special volume devoted to my achievements, starting from the conspiracy of Catiline and concluding with my return from exile? In view of our friendship, I can rely on you not only to record my deeds but also to glorify them. That period of my career has all the ingredients of great literature; and so its triumphs and disasters ought to be set forth to the fullest advantage.
I do hope you will undertake this task; otherwise I shall have to do it myself. Then I shall feel inhibited from presenting the drama in its full colours, and the impact on posterity will be impaired. […]
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- Author and Audience in Latin Literature , pp. 18 - 32Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 1992
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