/lit/ - Literature

>>17100200
Go to a Barnes and noble philosophy section and there’s a great selection of recent stoicism books!

how much stoicism could you possibly need

>>17100200
Musonius Rufus is a pretty important but obscure one. He influenced Epictetus’ work.

>>17100200
There aren't significant surviving writings from any others, but there's fragments from a few at least.
>>17100259
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

>>17100269
I wanted to get some fresh perspectives since all three in the OP lived during Pax Romana.

>>17100200
Marcus Aurelius is definitely the best out of those three since his writings actually read like they were written for humans. Epictetus reads like a soulless robot.
You've more or less found the best Stoics, though. Now you need to read about Epicureanism so you can ascend to the Stoic-Epicurean synthesis.

>>17100542
Seneca mentions Epicurus all the time in his letters, but why isn't he considered a stoic?

>>17100558
Apparently there was a big disagreement between Epicureanism and Stoicism, I guess a rivalry that naturally arises when you both have schools competing for students. Later on the Stoics dumped most of their metaphysics and just shifted into the ethical side of things, and then they found themselves largely aligned with Epicurus, as we see in Seneca's letters. So few surviving works of either school remain that there isn't a lot of disagreement you can find directly in text.

>>17100558
Epicurus wasn't a Stoic because he didn't think virtue was an end in itself. For Epicurus, pleasure was the end, and pain was the thing to be avoided. Epicurus emphasized virtue in order to minimize pain and maximize pleasure, unlike the Stoics, who argued that avoiding pain should be secondary to pursuing virtue.

>>17100735
ultimately just difference of semantics, I remember in one of Seneca's letters he wrote that while the Epicureans seeks pleasure and Stoics seek virtue, virtue is essentially interchangeable with 'pleasure' (virtue is what brings a rational being pleasure)

Have a feeling that the main reason the Stoics didn't say they sought pleasure was because of the dirty connotations of the word, I'm sure it was the same then as it is today, hence why Epicureanism always got and always does get degraded for being hedonistic (modern sense) degeneracy

>>17100735
Ultimately I think it's just difference of semantics, I remember in one of Seneca's letters he wrote that while the Epicureans seeks pleasure and Stoics seek virtue, virtue is essentially interchangeable with 'pleasure' (virtue is what brings a rational being pleasure)

Have a feeling that the main reason the Stoics didn't say they sought pleasure was because of the dirty connotations of the word, I'm sure it was the same then as it is today, hence why Epicureanism always got and always does get erroneously degraded for being hedonistic degeneracy (in the modern sense of the word)

Anon, in any of those books there is already enough to figure everything out. Put away your books on life and start living.

>>17100958
>Put away your books on life and start living
are you sure you belong on /lit/?

>>17100978
You misunderstand. I mean that with Stoicism specifically, one could even say one misses the point if one's drawn to read more of it, due to its nature. Reading more Stoics will not bring more knowledge of Stoicism.

>>17100200
The only Stoic philosopher you should read is Epictetus. HE IS THE ONLY ONE. The rest is just second-hard garbage—including Aurelius and Seneca.

Musonius Rufus. There's fragments from others but after Rufus you're time is better spent with Cicero and Plutarch.

>>17101337
Also check out Xenophon's Socratic dialogues. They're not strictly Stoic but they are actually what inspired Zeno.

LVCIVS ANNÆVS SENECA SHOULD NOT BE LUMPED WITH THE STOICS; THE FORMER'S ETHOS IS CONTRATHETICAL TO THAT OF STOICISM, THEREFORE TO THE LATTER SENEQUISM SHOULD BE APPOSED.

>>17101874
you don't need to say 'the former' since you only introduced one person in the preceding clause. you can just say 'him'.

BAP

>>17101900


NO.

>>17101874
>THE FORMER'S ETHOS IS CONTRATHETICAL TO THAT OF STOICISM
how so?

You're pretty much done
Stoicism is fairly straightforward and simple
If you really want extra
Check out the fragments of Cleanthes and the related sections of Diogenes Laertius
As others have said, if you want to continue more generally, Aristotle, Plutarch, Cicero, Montaigne, La Rochefoucauld... Sterne... Vasistha Yoga, Ramayana

>>17101915


BOTH: THE STOIC, AND THE SENEQUIST, RECOGNIZE THE FATALITY, AND THE TRANSIENCE, INHERENT TO THE KOSMOS, AND TO THE THINGS OF THE WORLD, BUT WHILST THE FORMER RESIGNS HIMSELF TO THEM, ENDURING, THE LATTER COMBATS THEM, TRANSCENDING.

>>17101938
>THE LATTER COMBATS THEM, TRANSCENDING
ehm... Seneca does not combat death. He accepts it fully and says multiple times throughout his letters that death is part of nature that one should not be reluctant to accept.

>>17101974


HE RECOGNIZES IT, ACCEPTS IT AS A NATURAL GIVEN, BUT HE DOES NOT RESIGN HIMSELF TO IT.

>>17101995
No wonder you're a namefag if you throw around these vacuous terms without any explanation. How does he not resign himself to it? What the fuck is the difference between "recognizing and accepting it" and "resigning to it"?

>>17102013
That guy is a twat but there is a difference. To be resigned to something implies that you have let it dominate your existence and identity while one can recognise and accept something without needing to shoulder its yoke.

>>17101874
>>17101912
>>17101938
>>17101995
>A senequist pedo

>>17100542
>Epictetus reads like a soulless robot.
agree

>>17100542
>Epictetus reads like a soulless robot.
terrible take