The Use of the Apostrophe and the Fictionality of Declamation

Building on van Mal-Maeder’s work on fictionality in Roman declamation, this chapter examines the poetics of declamation in Seneca the Elder’s compilations. When read from a literary standpoint, declamatory texts consist of two key components: the fabula (‘content’) and the discours (‘means of conveying said content’). The chapter concerns itself primarily with the latter, and specifically with the rhetorical concept of apostrophe (α‎̓ποστροφη‎́́), during which speakers address the subject about whom they are declaiming in direct speech. The analysis outlines the communicative strategies involved in this rhetorical technique, along with its implications on both the intradiegetic and extradiegetic narrative planes, and determines the extent to which apostrophe and its variants can be regarded as signs for the fictionality of a given declamation.

Intertextuality in Seneca the Elder

This chapter consists of two parts, both of which centre upon intertextuality in the Controversiae and Suasoriae and place special emphasis on Seneca’s use of allusion. Pingoud outlines the role played by Cicero, Ovid, Horace, and Lucretius on the language of Senecan declamation by examining how Seneca imitates these authors both to teach and to entertain his audience. Rolle similarly explores the ramifications of intertextuality on Seneca’s writing by investigating how Greek oratorical texts influenced Latro’s characterization (Controversiae 1.praef). She reveals that every aspect of Latro—from his voice to his physical appearance—is based on Greek ideals of the ideal declaimer, but notes the subtle ways in which Latro’s persona is deliberately and pointedly set apart from that of Demosthenes.

Greek Declaimers, Roman Context

This chapter compares the two main groups of declaimers in the Controversiae and Suasoriae: the oft-maligned ‘Greeks’ and the ‘Latins’, whom Seneca favours. By analysing how these factions competed with one another and thought of each other, this chapter suggests that these rigid categories did not exist in reality, but were superimposed retroactively by Seneca upon his corpus of declamatory speeches as an organizing principle. In reality, Greek and Latin declaimers coexisted in greater harmony than Seneca’s comments would suggest. Similarly, declamation is not a Roman practice, as Seneca implies in Book 1 of his Controversiae, but a Graeco-Latin phenomenon which at times necessitated bilingual knowledge of both cultures’ literatures. This chapter demonstrates, moreover, that the true differentiating factor within the community of declaimers was neither origin nor language, but social and economic issues along with personal rivalries.

The Bitter Medicine of History

This chapter investigates how Seneca the Elder negotiates the generic position of declamation in his Controversiae and Suasoriae. It argues that his practice shows a perception of close generic affinity between declamation and poetry, and focuses on his attempt to force his readers into a closer engagement with historiography. In the course of critiquing declamations, Seneca not infrequently offers as extra-declamatory comparanda examples from poetry, and especially from epic. He appears to take for granted his audience’s acceptance of the models of poetic description and poetic pathos. History, by contrast, does not appear as a parallel genre in the Controversiae and is cited only in the divisio of the sixth suasoria, on whether Cicero should ask Antony to spare him. Seneca expects his audience to be distressed by the introduction of historiographical texts, but insists on an extensive engagement with historical treatments as non alienum to the subject. This juxtaposition of attitudes suggests awareness on the part of Seneca’s audience of a generic identity centred on fictionality (a crucial distinction from traditional oratory). By centring his discussion on this exemplum, moreover, Seneca uses the most temporally proximate subject, Cicero’s death, to make the strongest possible argument for the potential benefit of history to the future development of the declamatory genre.

Controversial Games

This chapter takes a closer look at the multiplicity of voices in the Controversiae and Suasoriae, which often clash in opinion, style, and tone. It demonstrates how these voices centre around recurrent themes ranging from imitation and the immortality of literature to sociocultural connections such as the link between the decadence of Imperial Rome and certain styles of declamation, as well as the relationship between eloquence and political power. These motifs are explored against the backdrop of multiple levels of discourse: Seneca’s comments addressed to his sons, the speeches of the declaimers which Seneca frames as ‘fictitious’, and the witty phrases and bons mots which they allegedly delivered in reality. By outlining the orality shared by these discourse levels, moreover, this chapter demonstrates how they collectively mimic declamatory practice and thus contribute to Seneca’s didactic goals.

Laughing Is No Laughing Matter

Seneca ends his preface to the seventh book of the Controversiae with the statement Video, quid velitis: sententias potius audire quam iocos (‘I can see what you want‚ to hear epigrams, not jokes’). However, laughter can be heard throughout Seneca’s text, not in the declamations themselves, the topics of which are rarely ever funny, but in the world of the declaimers where it is used as a very effective instrument of control: any breaking of the rules—whether aesthetic or ethical in nature—is punished by a burst of laughter or a harsh joke at the rule-breaker’s expense. By outlining instances in this category, this chapter demonstrates the seriousness with which laughter within the declamatory arena ought to be taken.

The Ocean (Seneca Suas. 1)

This chapter traces a single motif—that of the ‘Ocean’—within Seneca’s Suasoriae. This theme spans the declamations of Argentarius, Pompeius Silo, Moschus, Musa, Albucius Silus, and Papirius Fabianus, as well as verses by Albinovanus Pedo and excerpts from the History of Alexander by Quintus Curtius Rufus. By comparing how these declaimers and authors introduce variations around the idea of an ‘ocean’ while maintaining its overall characteristics (e.g. darkness, monstrousness, sluggishness), this chapter identifies two overarching concepts which governed declamatory improvisation. On the one hand, ‘scalability’ allowed declaimers to compose speeches of different lengths while maintaining thematic coherence through the use of similar core-structures; on the other, the principle of ‘sequence’ dictated that each declaimer spoke in response to another. These parallel concepts enabled declamatory themes to gain new meanings through an ongoing accumulation of arguments and contributed to declamation’s status as a dynamic, interactive process.

Between Real and Fictional Eloquence

In his critical edition of fragmentary Roman oratory of the Augustan and Tiberian periods, Andrea Balbo has dealt with many declaimers who were active both in the schools and the forum or during centumviral trials. We know about their activity in particular from Seneca the Elder: among those are L. Arruntius Pater, C. Albucius Silus, M. Porcius Latro, and T. Labienus, as well as Cassius Severus. This chapter examines some of the school speeches witnessed by Seneca with regard to their stylistic features and compares the characteristics of these fictional orations with fragments of real oratory, giving particular attention to rhetorical elements that can be ascribed to actio, and special emphasis on the declamatory contributions of Albucius Silus and Porcius Latro.

Physical Excess as a Marker of Genre in the Elder Seneca

This chapter stems from the observation that physical eloquence is often relegated to lesser importance than its linguistic counterpart in Senecan declamation, especially when compared to the wealth of information we have on Cicero’s use of gesture. However, actio remains a pivotal element of Roman declamation. To draw attention to this element, this chapter outlines several types of bodily movement and vocal modulation which Seneca attributes to his declaimers in the Controversiae and Suasoriae. In so doing, it not only describes the practice and function of these actions but also explores how they build into the characteristics of Senecan declamation, which range from the use of personae and sententiae to prose rhythm and the figure of the ideal orator. The analysis ultimately explains why declaimers’ gestures, which are often dismissed as ‘excessive’ by modern readers, acted as effective tools for communication within their original context.

Introduction

This introduction explains the nature of ‘declamation’, not only in terms of the genre’s specific attributes but also in comparison with other Latin literary forms such as epic, satire, historiography, and philosophy. It also contains chapter summaries for the volume as a whole and outlines major trends in recent scholarship on Seneca the Elder. In the process, it outlines the characteristics which differentiate Seneca’s writings on declamation from those of other Roman writers, and suggests that the role of ancient declaimers is similar to that of modern scholars: both groups are tasked with organizing, evaluating, ranking, and reinterpreting declamatory speeches.