Seneca's Epistolary 'Responsum'

Although Seneca's De Ira has long been considered a standard Stoic approach to anger in dialogue form, its structure more closely approximates that of an epistle. The prevalence of legal terminology as well as numerous and recurrent legal contexts suggest that Seneca used the Epistolary Responsum of the jurisconsults as his model instead of the philosophical dialogue. Seneca's criticism of the delict Iniuria in a legal genre disguised as a Stoic moral essay parodies the Responsum and, as a consequence, effectively reveals law as a convenient pretext and source of a social ill it purports to remedy.

Autorentext

The Author: William E. Wycislo was born in Chicago, Illinois, and studied at St. Louis University, The University of Illinois at Chicago, and Loyola University of Chicago, where he received his Ph.D. in Classics in 1996. He is currently Assistant Professor of Classics at Ball State University in Muncie, Indiana.

Inhalt
Contents: De Ira Criticism of Roman law The delict «Iniuria» De Ira as parody Epistolary Responsum of jurisconsults Philosophical dialogue.