SOURCE: Riggsby, Andrew M. “Self and Community in Pliny the Younger.” Arethusa 31, no. 1 (winter 1998): 75-97.

In the following essay, Riggsby shows how a comparison between Pliny's letters and those of other Roman authors who concerned themselves with the role of the orator reveals him as an extremely conservative intellectual in terms of his thinking on the relationship between the individual and community.

Pliny the Younger described himself as an imitation, if a somewhat pale one, of Cicero (4.8.4-5, 9.2.2-3). In a recent paper examining this connection, I argued that its value for Pliny lay in the identification of both men as orators and the further identification of the orator as an “engaged public figure.”¹ In this paper, I want to nuance that claim by giving further consideration to the connection between “engaged” and “public.” Examination of this notion involves consideration of the interaction of individuals with a community...