lyric or satire-or else a letter, as highly polished as any of these. He does not make it clear whether the letter is prose or verse- it may, we must remember, be the latter, in the
model of Horace's or Ovid's 'epistles'. The Younger Pliny's stylish collection of letters is one of the most elegant and informative witnesses to the culture and education of
the time It is interesting, and perhaps surprising, that we have so little comparable Greek material We have, it is true, a mass of Greek letters dating from this period; but
these are fictions, purporting to be written by imaginary characters or historical figures They are little more than rhetorical exercises, though occasionally (as in the Letters
of Crates and Chion of Heraclea) we find sets of letters composed to form something like epistolary romance.
This may remind us that the last of the areas in which Kunstprosa was employed is pure fiction. This was a late development, despite the partial classical model of
Xenophon's Cyropaedia. Origins and influences are hotly debated; whether the characteristic content is of 'oriental' origin and whether the stories were used as a vehicle for
religious teaching, specifically that of the mystery religions, are questions which have been repeatedly raised and variously answered over the past century. What seems
certain is that the novel, not being a part of the high classical tradition, originally had a different audience in view from history or philosophy. It gradually makes its way
into more sophisticated circles, sometimes viewed patronizingly and parodied, sometimes taking its place as a serious successor to epic and drama. The surviving Greek
novels are surprisingly similar in plot, and it is a plot which has the suggestiveness of myth. Two lovers undergo long travels, dangers, and separations, their chastity is
sorely tried, but they are ultimately united and live happily ever after. Such is the framework of the novels of Chariton, Longus, Achilles Tatius, Xenophon of Ephesus, and
Heliodorus. Their tones and settings of course differ: love, magic, violence, humour, the curiosities of distant countries and remote historical times, the rhetoric of trials and
debates, are standard ingredients, present in varied degree. Most charming to modern readers is the pastoral romance of Longus, Daphnis and Chloe; most divergent from
the common pattern are the two Latin examples, Petronius' Satyrica and Apuleius' Metamorphoses. The novel is, in many ways, the most intriguing literary achievement of
the period; it looks forward to mediaeval romance, and it is one of the roots of modern prose fiction. But it is an escapist form; set in the past or at the ends of the earth, its
fictions generally portray the human condition with the minimum of reference to the social and political structures within which its readers lived.
Seneca: Father and Son
The remains of this literature fill many volumes. Many of the Greek authors- Plutarch, Lucian, Aristides-were morally and stylistically ideal texts for Byzantine education,
and their survival was assured. The Latins were less lucky. Though Pliny's Natural History and Seneca were much read in the medieval West, Tacitus survived by a singular
accident, and much important historical writing has been lost. But, in both languages, there is a lot to read; and we must confine ourselves here to a brief indication of the
qualities of some of the principal figures.
Given the association between education and power, literary success and political activity, it is no wonder that families figure largely in the story. A good example is the
family of the Annaei, from Corduba in Spain, who held a high place in both literary and public life for three generations. L. Annaeus Seneca, 'the Elder', was born around
the middle of the first century B.C., studied at Rome in the triumviral and early Augustan period, and then divided his time between Rome and his native place. Like many
writers of the time (Livy, Caecilius of Caleacte, Dionysius) he was both historian and rhetorician, though he was not a professional teacher of rhetoric. Late in life, he
compiled for his three sons a collection of the brilliant rhetorical strokes he remembered from the 'declaimers' of his youth. His enthusiastic anthology has much charm. The
prefaces and character sketches especially display an attractive shrewdness. I cite as a specimen a piece from the 'deliberative exercises' (Suasoriae 2. 17), in which he
speaks of a connection of his own who made a fool of himself by his handling of the hackneyed theme of the Three Hundred Spartans at Thermopylae:
There was a person called Seneca-his name may have reached your ears-of a confused and disorderly cast of mind, who wanted to speak in the big style. In the end, this
weakness obsessed him and made him ridiculous. He wouldn't have slaves unless they were big, or silver vessels unless they were big. Believe me, I'm not joking. His
madness led him ultimately to wear shoes that were too big for him, to eat no figs except mariscae [these had a poor flavour, despite their size], and to have a mistress of
vast proportions. He was nicknamed Seneca Grandio. Well, when I was a young man, he gave a version of this exercise. He posed the objection: 'All who had been sent
from Greece ran away.' To answer it, he raised his hands, and stood on tip-toe (he used to do this, to seem bigger) and cried: 'I rejoice, I rejoice!' We wondered what piece of
luck had come his way. 'Xerxes will be entirely mine', he cried.
That is to say, speaking in the role of a Spartan at Thermopylae, he welcomed the absence of reinforcements, on the ground that he would be able to fight Xerxes and his
million men single-handed. Of the three sons to whom Seneca's anthology is addressed, one (Mela) was the father of the poet Lucan, one (No-vatus) was adopted by Junius
Gallio and appears in history as the proconsul of Achaea at the time of St Paul's stay in Corinth (Acts 18:12), and the middle son, another L. Annaeus Seneca, became
without question the leading literary figure of his generation, as well as a man of great wealth and influence, especially in the early years of Nero, whose tutor he was.