The therapeutic virtues of the banquet. Medicine and ideology in Plutarch's Table Talk.
Beautiful Letters| N° d'inventaire | 16145 |
| Format | 16 x 24 |
| Détails | 299 p., paperback. |
| Publication | Paris, 2012 |
| Etat | Nine |
| ISBN | |
This book examines a work from the Second Sophistic period that revives the scholarly discussions held at banquets between Plutarch and various guests. It proposes to study the place and function of medical theories and to systematically explore the relationship, little studied until now, that unites the fields of medicine and banqueting. This convivial event, as presented and idealized in Table Talk, has therapeutic and preventive virtues for the individual and the group associated with it. To make these virtues manifest, the guests and the narrator invoke different medical theories, using terms related to medicine and the physiology of bodies. Thus, the president of the banquet, the philosophical discussions, the dosage of wine and that of food recall the doctor at work and the different types of remedies he prescribes. But Table Talk also makes a connection between banquet conduct, bodily pathology, and social and political behavior, symptomatic of Plutarch's shift from scholarly banquets and medical theories to his ideological biases. This study highlights an unexplored aspect of Plutarch's thought: his vision of the banquet conceived not only as a remedy for the body and a moderator of passions, but also as a regulator of human relations. The banquet would thus constitute, in the author's eyes, an effective preventive treatment at a time when balance between members of the multiethnic community, respect, and peaceful coexistence were essential values.
This book examines a work from the Second Sophistic period that revives the scholarly discussions held at banquets between Plutarch and various guests. It proposes to study the place and function of medical theories and to systematically explore the relationship, little studied until now, that unites the fields of medicine and banqueting. This convivial event, as presented and idealized in Table Talk, has therapeutic and preventive virtues for the individual and the group associated with it. To make these virtues manifest, the guests and the narrator invoke different medical theories, using terms related to medicine and the physiology of bodies. Thus, the president of the banquet, the philosophical discussions, the dosage of wine and that of food recall the doctor at work and the different types of remedies he prescribes. But Table Talk also makes a connection between banquet conduct, bodily pathology, and social and political behavior, symptomatic of Plutarch's shift from scholarly banquets and medical theories to his ideological biases. This study highlights an unexplored aspect of Plutarch's thought: his vision of the banquet conceived not only as a remedy for the body and a moderator of passions, but also as a regulator of human relations. The banquet would thus constitute, in the author's eyes, an effective preventive treatment at a time when balance between members of the multiethnic community, respect, and peaceful coexistence were essential values.