Self-Fashioning in Late-Antique Epistolary Corpora

Letter-collections are an incredible source for addressing issues of authorial practices and self-representation strategies, and are equally important for mapping out micro-histories. The letter-collection of Isidore of Pelusium is an interesting case, extremely understudied, which contains around 2000 items, testified in a rich manuscript tradition across several manuscript cultures. Isidores letters will be analysed with the aim of producing a portrayal of the authorial persona in conversation with a number of select addresses from three perspectives: the rhetorical language used for self-presentation; the networking strategies employed by the author in the process of selecting specific addresses, and also in positioning himself in conversation with them, and the resulting image from the corpus as a whole; this will probably give us access less to the personality of the author and more to his mediated self- presentation. In analysing this aspects, I shall focus on a sample of letters which Isidore sent out to notable persons, from all over the social strata (bishops, the emperor, monks, scholastikoi), most of them outside Pelusium, but some also local. The advantage of this approach is that it helps us to better understand regional contexts away from the major metropolitan centres, and represents therefore a different, regionalised, perspective on letter-collections when compared to authors of a different social standing such as Libanius, Gregory of Nazianzus, or Psellos. This project will also produce a critical edition of about 100 Isidorian letters, complemented by a digital edition [of a selection of letters] which will give the possibility of including and presenting different levels of transmission of a letter from the individual manuscript to the complex dynamic of the corpus.

This project proposes an investigation of the epistolary author with an emphasis on the late-antique corpus preserved under the name of Isidore of Pelusium. It explores how the persona of the presumed author is styled from three perspectives: the rhetorics within the corpus, the outer edges of the author's network and the corpus' reception. First, the authorial image is constructed through the way in which the epistolographers present themselves in their letters, through the subjects they choose, and the stylistic devices they use. Secondly, this initial image is then reinforced in the manners in which the correspondents are carefully chosen, cherished and admonished. By focusing on the fifth century large corpus of letters preserved under the name of Isidore of Pelusium, this project shows how Isidore negotiated his image by carefully positioning himself in a position of power and of influence: there are letters in the corpus presumably sent to the bishops around Pelusium such as Macarius (of Metelis?), Hermogenes (of Rhinokorura?), Theopemptus (of Cabasa?), or Heracleides (of Tamiathis?), to influential theologians of the day - Evagrius (Ponticus?) and John (Cassian?), and no less than to the emperor Theodosius II and to Cyril of Alexandria. The efficiency of alluding to the historical characters beyond these rather vague first names secured Isidore a fairly prominent place among late antique Christian writers and strongly safeguarded the afterlife of his collection and gave it a universal touch. Moreover, this resulting image from within the confines of the corpus was then put into dialogue with the authorial image emerging from the mechanics of the corpus transmission: the disposition in manuscripts and then the printing of the corpus are also factoring in when looking at the collection we currently have. While some authors self-publish their work in a specific order, with a particular letter as the opening, and others leave clear directions on how they would like their corpus published after their death, there are no strong indications that Isidore might have done the same. Thus, this project undertook a complex process which analysed the authorial fashioning from within the corpus, but also from all throughout its later reception. This was also put into dialogue with similar practices from different authors and manuscript cultures from all throughout late antiquity and beyond. Through the sheer number of letters preserved and the manuscripts in which they were copied, we can have a glimpse into a vibrant monastic community around him and into the social and cultural ramifications of his literary activity.