Father and Son: gli affetti privati nella Lettera 78 di Seneca

Abstract

This article analyses the topic of filial piety and love as it emerges from Seneca’s Letter 78. In the first part of this letter, Seneca recalls a tormenting illness that afflicted him when he was younger: he meditated about suicide, but in the end he decided to live on out of love for his old father. A painful choice, which is nevertheless justified in terms of Stoic philosophy, especially according to the οἰκείωσις theory. Three paradigms are at play behind Seneca’s self-fashioning, namely Aeneas, Hercules, and Socrates. In Letter 78, as well as in Letter 104, Seneca offers himself as an example of reasonable choice between life and death: despite Seneca’ notorious “hymns to suicide”, duties towards the loved ones are a superior reason to go on living.