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Home , Epicurus, Heraclitus

Colloquium 3 Epicurean Poetics Elizabeth Asmis

If one were to ask people to rank the contributions made by the Epicureans to philosophy, I would not be surprised if poetic the- ory were near the bottom of most people's lists, or altogether missing, whereas poetry itself might well be at the top. The ancient quarrel between philosophy and poetry seems to have played itself out in an extreme in . has the reputation of the most hostile to poetry of any Greek philosopher. But some of his later followers were clearly devoted to poetry, and one of them, , achieved a remarkable reconciliation between philosophy and poetry. In this paper, I propose to investigate the road between Epicurus and Lucretius. What were Epicurus' views, and to what extent did his followers adopt, modify, or jettison his views? We know that in other areas Epicurus' followers went to great lengths to show that their views were consistent with those of their leader. The more innovative they were, it seems, the more they insisted on their orthodoxy. The problem of orthodoxy became especially acute at the when was head of the Epicurean school at , about the end of the second century to the early 70's B.C.1 The period of Copyright @ 1992 Elizabeth Asmis. From the paper read October 25,1990, at Boston Unibersity as part of the 13th Annual Boston Area Colloquium in . 1. The problem of orthodoxy is well attested in the areas of and , as well as and poetry. On epistemology see Asmis 1984, esp. pp. 220-224. When Zeno of Sidon was head of the Epicurean school there was a very acrimonious debate among Epicureans on who observed Epicurus' teachings about whether rhetoric is a craft. This debate is discussed in detail by Sedley 1989; see also Asmis 1990, pp. 2400-2402. In his work IIepi 7tapP1'\oiaç; (fr. 45.8-11 Olivieri), sums up the loyalty of Epicurus' followers in a statement which is virtually an oath of loyalty : xai co avvexov xai !C'UPl/có't[a]'tov, Zeno and his immediate followers is also a time when the Epicureans showed an especially strong interest in poetry. Zeno and his student Philodemus of Gadara both offered comprehen- sive criticisms of poetic theories; and while Lucretius' great poem on the of the overshadows all contempo- rary poetry, Philodemus' epigrams are among the most elegant examples of this genre. There are just a few, well known bits of evidence about Epicurus' views on poetry. But these testi- monies, in conjunction with the much larger and partially unfa- miliar body of evidence concerning the later period, suggest that there is greater continuity between Epicurus and his followers than has been thought. The allegorist (about the first century A.D.) pairs Epicurus with as a detractor of , while charging him with deriving his doctrines from the great poet. Heraclitus accuses Epicurus of condemning all of poetry, not just Homer; and he describes Epicurus as "purifying himself (홢xcpocrt01>llevoç) from all of poetry at once as a destructive lure of fictitious sto- ries."2 He also charges that, although Epicurus condemned poetry, he was a "Phaeacian" philosopher who, by misinterpret- ing Odysseus' words to , stole from Homer the notion that the supreme good is .3 Another late author, Athenaeus, associates Epicurus with Plato as someone who expelled Homer from cities.4 But Epicurus' hostility to poetry is not as simple a as Heraclitus and Athenaeus make out. According to Heraclitus, the Homeric words that Epicurus misinterpreted were: 8rav eùcppocr1>vr¡ Il£V ëXl1Ka't홢X o'Í11l0V 홢1tav'ta, 8awv홢ove5 8' 홢va 8홢D)iaT' aKotxx^covtai aoi8ov TO'U'GO 21'.1.01 Kaa,홢L1620V Èvt cppsaiv eïoe'tat.

'E1tlICOúprot. ICaJIj' ov çijv i](t)¡>tÍIlE8a. 7tEt/8apxÝ¡croIlEV ("the basic and most impor- tant [principle] is that we will obey Epicurus, according to whom we have cho- sen to live"). 2. Homerie Problems 79 and 4 (= U 229), including at 4: å7tacrav °ll°\) 7tOtT]'tt1d¡v Z6홢mF-p oM8ptoV llú8rov 8éÎ..Eap 홢tqK>crtOÚIlEVoç. 3. Homeric Problems 79 = partly at U 229. 4. Deipnosophistae 5,187c = U 228.