Cicero's ‘De Officiis'
A Critical Guide

This Guide presents a multi-perspectival, scholarly collection of essays, the first devoted to one of Cicero's most influential philosophical works.

Raphael Woolf (Edited by)

9781316518014, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 29 June 2023

270 pages
23.5 x 15.7 x 2 cm, 0.53 kg

Cicero's De Officiis, perhaps his most influential philosophical work, ranges over a wide variety of themes, from the role of the family in society to the question of whether our duties can conflict with one another, and from the moral significance of offence to the question of whether it is right to kill a dictator. This Critical Guide, the first collection of essays devoted to the work, is helpfully organised in thematic sections and aims to illuminate both the main individual topics of De Officiis and their interconnections, with essays by an international team of contributors that will allow readers to appreciate the work's distinctive blend of philosophical theory and social and political reality. It will be valuable for a range of readers in fields including philosophy, classics and political theory.

Introduction Raphael Woolf
Part I. The Framework of De Officiis: 1. The family in De Officiis J. P. F. Wynne
2. Conflict of duties in Cicero's De Officiis Georgia Tsouni
Part II. The Role of Virtue: 3. Oikei?sis and the origin of virtue Brad Inwood
4. Cicero's project in book 2 of De Officiis Malcolm Schofield
5. Cicero's De Officiis on practical deliberation Christopher Gill
Part III. Exemplary Ethics: 6. De Officiis and exemplary ethics Rebecca Langlands
7. Emulation and moral development in De Officiis Georgina White
Part IV. Self and Society: 8. Care of the (written) self: literary and ethical decorum in De Officiis Caroline Bishop
9. Cicero and the cynics Sean McConnell
Part V. Politics: 10. Patriotism and cosmopolitanism in Cicero's De Officiis Jed W. Atkins
11. Cicero's extremist ethics Ingo Gildenhard
Bibliography, Index.

Subject Areas: Ethics & moral philosophy [HPQ], Western philosophy: Ancient, to c 500 [HPCA]