How to grieve : an ancient guide to the lost art of consolation / inspired by Marcus Tullius Cicero ; translated and introduced by Michael Fontaine.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Cicero, Marcus Tullius, Author.

Contributor:

Cicero, Marcus Tullius, contributor.

Fontaine, Michael, translator.

Series:

Ancient wisdom for modern readers. .

Ancient wisdom for modern readers

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Tullia, active 1st century B.C.

Tullia.

Cicero, Marcus Tullius.

Consolatio.

Consolation.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (264 p.)

Place of Publication:

Princeton ; Oxford : Princeton University Press, [2022]

Language Note:

In English.

Summary:

"At the age of 33, Tullia Ciceronis died from complications due to childbirth. Her father, the consul Marcus Tullius Cicero, was utterly distraught, as his contemporary letters and passages in the Tusculan Disputations make clear. And in an effort to grieve, Cicero did something new in world history: for the first time, he wrote a consolation speech-not for others, as had always been done, but for himself. This was his coping strategy, and it prefigures the Meditations of Marcus Aurelius and so many other thinkers throughout history who write letters to themselves. Cicero's Consolation was lost in antiquity. In the Renaissance, a philologist named Charles (Carlo) Sigoni recreated the speech. He gathered all the extant quotations and, on the analogy of restoring missing pieces of sculpture or lost paintings, he drew on everything he could find in Cicero to write a new speech that effectively recreated the lost one. And for a while, it worked. For centuries many great scholars believed Sigoni really had discovered the speech, rather than recreated it. Alas, subsequent scholarship has proven the opposite. Signoni very probably did write it. But the authorship question is less important than the contents. The speech shows that Sigoni knew all the conventions of the Consolation genre, and the historical events of Tullia's life, at least as well as any scholar then or now. It is a masterpiece: a fascinating read in Classical Latin, and it deserves a wide audience"-- Provided by publisher.

Contents:

Frontmatter

Contents

Acknowledgments

Introduction

How to Grieve

Notes

Bibliography

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Description based on print version record.

ISBN:

9780691220338

0691220336

OCLC:

1336403894