This volume includes a selection of the most significant Plutarchean essays published by Paola Volpe Cacciatore, Professor of Greek Language and Literature at the University of Salerno and current President of the International Plutarch Society.
Philology, philosophy, commentary and reception in Plutarch’s work are only some of the main topics discussed within a large academic output devoted to the writer of Chaeronea by Professor Paola Volpe Cacciatore.
The volume is divided into four parts: Plutarchean Fragments, Quaestiones convivales, Religion & Philosophy, and Plutarch’s Reception from Humanism to Modern Times. Finally, there is a single bibliographical part which includes all the references mentioned in the book.
The eighteen studies collected in this volume, originally published in Italian and here translated into English, concern the Corpus Plutarcheum, including Table-Talks, De Iside et Osiride, the treatises against the Stoics, De genio Socratis, De liberis educandis, De musica, and some Plutarchean fragments.
Professor Paola Volpe Cacciatore confronts many interesting issues discussed in Plutarch’s Moralia from the point of view, and with the ars critica, of a classical philologist who holds the forma mentis of a philosopher, identifying solutions worthy of attention and reaching a rare depth of analysis.
Plutarch’s polymathia in Table Talks, and the reception of the Plutarchean essays from humanism to modern times combine history, poetry, pedagogy and music, while the studies on De Iside et Osiride and the treatises against the Stoics offer debates around, and connections between, myth, religion and philosophy, concerning justice, wisdom and philanthropy.
The Plutarchean fragments offer a precious testimony of indirect textual tradition throughout the centuries, and Professor Paola Volpe Cacciatore analyses the issues around the understanding of lost texts, and suggests valuable reflections on forgotten parts of Plutarch’s work that have survived thanks to the quotations of other ancient authors.
Furthermore, the constant tension between a passion for the ancient world, and its study, interpretation and re-presentation in different eras up to the contemporary era, from a multi-disciplinary and integrated point of view, is precisely one of the cornerstones of the work of Professor Paola Volpe Cacciatore.
From Aeschylean tragedy to the Byzantine writers, passing through Sophoclean and Euripidean studies, the reception of Classical works and myths in humanism and in the modern and contemporary eras, she has been passionately and tirelessly engaged in continuous research, whilst also dispensing suggestions and academic advice to students.
We would like to thank Professors F. Lautaro Roig Lanzillotta and Delfim F. Leão, editors of “Brill’s Plutarch Studies,” for deciding to include this volume in the series as a tribute to celebrate the lifelong study of Plutarch’s work by Professor Paola Volpe Cacciatore: the impulse given by her to Plutarchean studies, both in Italy and within the international academic community, certainly distinguishes her as one of the most remarkable Plutarchean scholars of the last decades.
Serena Citro
Fabio Tanga