Over Memorial Day weekend, I did a decent amount of reading. One of the essays I read was Detlev Dormeyer's The Hellenistic Letter-Formula and the Pauline Letter-Scheme in Stanley E. Porter's The Pauline Canon.
In what is either a sure-fire sign that I'm addicted to blogging, or an insight that I should save for my SBL paper instead of squander on a blog post, the first thing I thought of while reading the article was that the practice of writing epistles (as described by Dormeyer) may really have been nothing more than the equivalent of blogging in ancient Greece.
First, recall some of the more mundane items I personally have blogged about:
I could find more, but I'm in a merciful mood. There's no need for you to relive my navel-gazing.
Now, compare that inanity with this excerpt from a letter from Cicero (with salient bits italicised):
I have no doubt that my daily letter must bore you, especially as I have no fresh news, nor can I find an excuse for a letter. If I should employ special messengers to convey my chatter to you without reason, I should be a fool but I cannot refrain from entrusting letters to folk who are bound for Rome, especially when they are members of my household. Beleive me, too, when I seem to talk with you, I have some little relief from sorrow, and, when, I read a letter from you, far greater relief. (Cicero, Att 8.14.1, quoted by Dormeyer in Porter, Pauline Canon, 60)
Basically, Cicero finds relief in writing his thoughts, no matter how insignificant, with a correspondent. And we thought James Joyce centered on the mundane!*
More importantly, check out what Dormeyer says about this sort of letter-writing:
The daily letters of Cicero do not transport 'fresh news' (nova de re aliqua), but serve to console and maintain a personal relationship. Because the writer has no 'definite subject' (nullo argumento proposito) he composes a literary form of talk (ut quais tecum loquor). (Dormeyer in Porter, Pauline Canon, 60).
Dormeyer continues:
Letters have an influence on other, more complex situations in writing: they can include legal questions, advice and honouring all at once. One aspect might dominate. But the fictitious form of the letter does not take on the features of an oral speech genre. ... That is why Deissmann suggested it would be worthwhile to distinguish between letter and epistle: a letter is private and written to an individual congregation or an individual person, whereas epistles are tractates with fictitous addressees. [Deissmann 1923: 157-72, 193-208] However, an objection could be raised to the effect that private writing is also fictitiously shaped, and, depending on the actual situation, can deliberately be designed that way (1Th 5.27). By the same token, epistles can have specific congregations as addressees (Eph 1.1-2). (Dormeyer, in Porter, Pauline Canon, 61)
Now, to be completely fair to Detlev Dormeyer, I am removing his writing entirely from its context, that of dealing with ancient epistlography. But the "ficticious written speech" of blogs could be analogous, in some way, to ancient epistles, couldn't it? Think about this additional quote from Cicero:
But as a sick heart not only robs me of sleep, but will not allow me even to keep awake without the greatest pain, I have begun to write to you something or other without a definite subject, that I may have a sort of talk with you [is] the only thing that gives me relief. (Cicero, Att 9.10.1, quoted by Dormeyer in Porter, Pauline Canon, 60)
How many bloggers can identify with the line, " ... I have begun to write to you something or other without a definite subject ... "? Several blog posts I've written have begun as unfocused notions regarding what I've read, seen or done. Writing about them clarifies; the subject or post title only comes after the post is composed.
That is, the act of writing itself is the discipline, the content is incidental. Well, not quite. The blog post content is a consequence of what I'm reading and experiencing — at least for me; others are most likely more disciplined.
Anyway, I couldn't shake this thought of ancient-day epistlography as an equivalent to modern-day blogging as I read Dormeyer's article. It probably is a sign that I'm addicted to blogging. Oh well. I suppose there are worse things one could be addicted to.
Update (2005-06-01): Jim Davila links from PaleoJudaica.com. Thanks for the link!
Update II (2005-06-02): Rogueclassicism comes through (via Paleojudaica.com) with a link as well. Thanks!
Update III (2005-06-02): The Rogueclassicism post is picked up on a linkblog called "robot wisdom" with the link title "Cicero's defense of blogging".
Update IV (2005-06-06): Perpendere posts a link as well. Thanks!
* No slight to Joyce's Ulysses, which was an amazing literary achievement. But that doesn't make it any less boring.