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20 results

  • Introduction

  • Edited by Margot Neger, University of Cyprus, Spyridon Tzounakas, University of Cyprus
  • Book:
    Intertextuality in Pliny's <i>Epistles</i>
    Published online:
    07 September 2023
    Print publication:
    21 September 2023, pp 1-26

  • Summary

    The introduction outlines the polyphonic and interactive character of Pliny the Younger’s Epistles by first looking at how Pliny constructs time and space of literary interaction in his social environment. The chapter then moves on with a discussion of interdiscursivity and generic interaction in Pliny’s letters and a review of scholarship on intertextuality. A case study of the triptych of letters 4.26-28 demonstrates how various forms of textual and non-textual interaction are combined in Pliny’s Epistles. Whereas the centrepiece of this series, Ep. 4.27 on the recitation of Sentius Augurinus’ poetry, focuses on oral exchange and mnemonic skills, the preceding letter (4.26) foregrounds the materiality of literature by playing with the motif of books as companions (comites) on journeys. The third letter (Ep. 4.28), on the other hand, emphasizes the visibility of famous writers whose portraits were placed and looked at in libraries. In addition to staging various forms of literary interaction, the triptych of Ep. 4.26-28 also showcases the letters’ intermediality. The introduction concludes with a key to the volume’s chapters.

  • Chapter 13 - Risus et indignatio: Scoptic Elements in Pliny’s Letters

  • from Part V - Pliny Turns Nasty: Satire and the Scoptic Tradition
  • Edited by Margot Neger, University of Cyprus, Spyridon Tzounakas, University of Cyprus
  • Book:
    Intertextuality in Pliny's <i>Epistles</i>
    Published online:
    07 September 2023
    Print publication:
    21 September 2023, pp 259-278

  • Summary

    Pliny the Younger’s Epistles contain a significant number of letters where Pliny presents himself as openly hostile to certain individuals by ridiculing them or expressing his indignation. The individuals who are the targets of Pliny’s epistolary invectives or satires usually do not appear as addressees in the collection: the chapter discusses Pliny’s letters 1.5 and 4.7 on Regulus, 7.29 and 8.6 on Pallas, 4.25 on an anonymous senator’s behaviour during a secret election and 6.15 on the faux pas of Iavolenus Priscus during a recitation. It then moves on with investigating how Pliny evokes the tradition of scoptic poetry, satire and invective not only in those letters where one would expect it, but also in letters which, at first glance, present themselves as friendly or joking conversations with various addressees such as Ep. 2.2 and 5.10. Here, the scoptic tone of literary models such as Catullus and Martial is transformed into a different context of communication, according to the conventions of epistolography.

Intertextuality in Pliny's Epistles
  • Edited by Margot Neger, Spyridon Tzounakas
  • Published online:
    07 September 2023
    Print publication:
    21 September 2023
  • Pliny's Epistles are full of literary artistry. This volume of essays by an impressive international team of scholars showcases this by exploring the intertextual, interdiscursive and also intermedial character of the collection. It provides a contribution to the recent scholarly interest in Latin prose intertextuality and in the literary and cultural interactions of the Imperial period. Focusing on the whole collection as well as on single books and selected letters, it investigates Pliny's strategies of incorporating literary models and genres into his epistolary oeuvre, thus creating a kind of 'super-genre' himself. In addition to displaying Pliny's literary techniques, the volume also serves as an advanced introduction to Latin prose poetics.