Bodies and Houses in Seneca's Moral Epistles 7 and 43

Amanda R. Wilcox (Williams College)

In the most colorful sections of Seneca's seventh Moral Epistle he describes a midday show in the arena, which consists, he writes, of "undiluted murder" (mera homicidia, 7.3). Seneca's grisly description of these fights, along with the crowd's reaction to them (7.3-5), are far more memorable than the letter's opening and closing passages, in which he counsels Lucilius to avoid the corrupting influence of crowds. Although it is not difficult to see how the letter's middle sections function as a moralizing illustration that demonstrates the wisdom of Seneca's advice, nevertheless, some readers have found the passage distasteful, or condemned it as a piece of rhetorical sensation-seeking hypocritically out of keeping with Seneca's avowed role as an adherent and a teacher of Stoic apatheia. In this paper I will argue that there is a more significant connection than previous treatments of this letter have appreciated between Seneca's advice to Lucilius to to "withdraw into [himself] as much as possible" (recede in te ipse quantum potes, 7.8) and his depiction of naked criminals, fighting to the death in the arena. To establish this link, I will look closely at the governing metaphor of another Moral Epistle, Letter 43. The image most fully developed in that letter is the house, which ideally stands with an open door (aperto ostio, 4) so that the actions of its inhabitants can be appraised by all. Nonetheless, the house also provides shelter so those who dwell there can live more securely (tutius, 3). Letter 43 sheds light on an extremely compressed image in the last sentence of Letter 7 (viz. "Let your goods face inwards," introrsus bona tua spectent, 12), which figures Lucilius' character as if it were a house, whose windows should look on to an interior courtyard, rather than the street. But unexpectedly, this metaphor also illuminates the graphic imagery that Seneca uses to describe the unprotected bodies of the combatants in the midday games. In the latter sections of Letter 7, Seneca advises Lucilius to retire from contact with crowds for his own protection. This sort of withdrawal is unavailable to Lucilius in Letter 43. As a provincial official, all his acts, even those that he considers private or trivial, will be scrutinized. Nonetheless, the ideal house that Seneca describes in Letter 43 may provide for the separation from other people that Seneca says is necessary for making philosophical progress (7.8-12), by virtue of the modest protection afforded by roof and walls. This protection is denied to criminals in the arena. Seneca describes their lack of clothing or defensive armor using the same vocabulary with which he describes the positive protective function of the good person's house. In a sense, the naked men in the arena are vulnerable to their bloodthirsty spectators in the same way that Lucilius is subject to public scrutiny in Sicily. However, the man who must live in the public eye is able to turn his visual vulnerability into an asset, so long as he has the shelter of a house in which he may live openly yet without being entirely exposed.