Table of Contents
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