Paideia Romana: Cicero's Tusculan Disputations takes a new look at an unloved text of the western canon to reveal it as a punchy and profoundly original work, arguably Cicero's most ingenious literary response to the tyranny of Caesar. The book shows how the Tusculans' much lambasted literary design, critically isolated prefaces, and overlooked didactic plot start to cohere once we read the dialogue for what it is: not a Latin treatise on Greek philosophy, but a Roman drama on education, with a strong political subtext. The first chapter ('The form – enigmas and answers') tries to make sense of those features of the work that scholars have found baffling or disappointing, such as the nondescript characters, the uncertain genre, or the lack of setting. Chapter 2 ('The prologues – in tyrannum and cultural warfare') analyses how Cicero in his prologues to the five individual books situates his desire to create and teach a 'Latin philosophy' within wider contexts, in particular the dictatorship of Caesar and the intellectual traditions of Greece and Rome. The final chapter 3 ('The plot – teacher and student') explores the pedagogy enacted in the dialogue as a form of constructive outreach, addressed to a future generation of Roman aristocrats. With its emphasis on rhetoric, literary artistry, and historical context, the present volume breaks with earlier scholarship on the Tusculans and thereby makes a significant contribution to the on-going reassessment of Cicero's thought and authorial practice.

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Contents
• Acknowledgements
• Introduction
  • Note on translations
• Chapter 1: the form – enigmas and answers
  • Introduction
  • A. Enigmas
    • I. The title
    • II. Genre
      • 1. Cicero’s generic labels
        • a. disputatio
        • b. schola and exercitatio
        • c. declamatio
        • d. sermo
      • 2. Cicero’s generic practice
    • III. Dramatis personae
      • 1. The stooge
      • 2. Cicero’s persona
        • a. Cicero as sophist
        • b. Cicero as teacher
    • IV. Setting
    • V. The excessively long translations from Greek tragedy
    • VI. Cicero’s endorsement of Epicurus
  • B. Answers
    • I. The historical background
    • II. Cicero’s literary apologiae, from de Oratore to de Finibus
      • 1. Cicero’s literary apologiae in the 50s
        • a. de Oratore
        • b. de Republica
        • c. de Legibus
      • 2. Cicero’s literary apologiae in 46–45 BCE
        • a. Brutus
        • b. Hortensius
        • c. Lucullus
        • d. Academica posteriora
        • e. de Finibus
      • 3. Taking stock
    • III. The Tusculans
      • 1. Political protest
        • a. The title and genre
        • b. Cicero’s persona
        • c. The setting
        • d. The long translations from the Greek
        • e. The endorsement of Epicurus
        • f. The beginning and the end
      • 2. Cicero’s paideia Romana
        • a. The interlocutor
        • b. From mega nepios to familiaris
        • c. Education as politics
      • 3. Sapping Greece
      • 4. Conclusion
    • IV. Cicero’s dialogues after the Tusculans
      • 1. de Natura Deorum
      • 2. de Divinatione
      • 3. de Fato
      • 4. de Officiis
• Chapter 2: The prologues – in tyrannum and cultural warfare
  • Introduction
  • A. The preface to Tusculan 1
    • I. Tusc. 1.1
      • 1. First segment
        • a. ‘… essem aliquando liberatus’
        • b. The dedication to Brutus
        • c. The syntax of maxime
        • d. Cicero’s time away from his studies
      • 2. Second segment
      • 3. Third segment
    • II. Tusc. 1.2
      • 1. Rome’s greatness – ethnic and historical perspectives
      • 2. litterae Latinae and Cato the Elder in Tusc. 1.2
      • 3. The list of virtutes
      • 4. ars vs. virtus
      • 5. From the de Republica to the Tusculan Disputations
    • III. Tusc. 1.3
      • 1. Culture and conquest
      • 2. The case of poetry
      • 3. Cato the Elder
    • IV. Tusc. 1.4
    • V. Tusc. 1.5
      • 1. The argument
      • 2. Cato the Elder and the absence of historiography
      • 3. The ages of oratory
      • 4. The ring composition with Tusc. 1.1
    • VI. Tusc. 1.6
    • VII. Tusc. 1.7–8
      • 1. Cicero’s genealogy
      • 2. The relationship between oratory and philosophy
      • 3. prudentiam cum eloquentia iungere: Cicero’s conception of ‘perfect philosophy’
  • B. The preface to Tusculan 2
    • I. The degree of commitment to philosophy
    • II. From oratory to philosophy
    • III. From domi to militiae
  • C. The preface to Tusculan 3
    • I. Structure and argument
    • II. Tinkering with Stoic doctrine
      • 1. The causes of διασσροϕή
      • 2. Cicero’s focus group: optimus quisque
      • 3. The role of the people in κασήχησις
      • 4. Roman political terminology
    • III. Plato
    • IV. Rome’s nomological knowledge
  • D. The preface to Tusculan 4
    • I. Apparent contradictions
    • II. Politics, wisdom and acculturation in the preface to Tusculan 4
      • 1. Tusc. 4.1
      • 2. Tusc. 4.2–4
      • 3. Tusc. 4.5–7
  • E. The preface to Tusculan 5
    • I. Fortuna and virtus
    • II. Exhortation to tyrannicide
• Chapter 3: the plot – teacher and student
  • A. Tusculan 1
    • I. Tusc. 1.9–17: preliminaries
      • 1. Those who die will have to face the horrors of the Underworld
      • 2. The state of being dead is wretched
      • 3. The prospect of dying makes life miserable
      • 4. Cicero’s handling of translation from the Greek in Tusc. 1.9–17
    • II. Tusc. 1.18–22
      • 1. Definition and blueprint: Tusc. 1.18a
      • 2. Views of the soul: Tusc. 1.18b–22
    • III. Tusc. 1.23–26a
      • 1. The irrelevance of doxography
      • 2. Tusculan 1 and Plato’s Phaedo
      • 3. utrumque confundere
    • IV. The first lecture: ascent to insight, the Roman way
    • V. Tusc. 1.76–82, the second lecture, and the epilogue
  • B. Tusculan 2
    • I. Preliminaries
    • II. The argument of Tusculan 2
  • C. Tusculans 3 and 4
  • D. Tusculan 5
• Conclusion
• Appendix A: The date of the Tusculans
• Appendix B: Genre matters
• Editions cited
• Bibliography
• Extended table of contents
• Index of passages
• Index of names and themes
• Back Cover