Anicius Manlius Severinus Boëthius Books

In Ciceronis Topica and De topicis differentiis are Boethius's two treatises on Topics (loci). Together these two works present Boethius's theory of the art of discovering arguments, a...

Selected works of Boethius including "Consolation of Philosophy" and "The Trinity is One God Not Three Gods".

Selected works of Boethius including "Consolation of Philosophy" and "The Trinity is One God Not Three Gods".

Although Chaucer’s 'Boece' has been edited many times, this is the first edition to offer not only a critical text but also collations with all extant medieval and late-medieval authorities and also with the modern critical editorial tradition. It thus presents both a reconstructed text and the materials from which that reconstruction was made. Beyond that, this edition offers a complete survey of the traditions of interpretive scholarship, literary as well as textual. If Chaucer’s 'Boece' does not offer an entirely new work to scholars of Middle English, it presents a familiar one in an entirely new fashion that is designed to enhance appreciation of how much works like the 'Boece' can reveal about medieval translation and manuscript transmission as well as about Chaucer as a writer.

Unjustly imprisoned and waiting to die, Boethius penned his last and greatest work, Consolation of Philosophy, an imaginary dialogue between himself and Philosophy, personified as a woman. Reminiscent of Dante in places, Boethius's fiction is an ode-to-philosophy-cum-Socratic-dialogue. Joel Relihan's skillful rendering, smoother to the modern ear than previous translations, preserves the book's heart-rending clarity and Boethius's knack for getting it just right. Listen to him on fortune: "We spin in an ever-turning circle, and it is our delight to change the bottom for the top and the top for the bottom. You may climb up if you wish, but on this condition: Don't think it an injustice when the rules of the game require you to go back down."Consolation of Philosophy recalls the transience of the material world, the eternality of wisdom, and the life of the philosopher. Boethius was deeply influenced by the Platonist tradition, and this piece is one of the more powerful and artful defenses of a detachment that feels almost Buddhist. For anyone who's felt at odds with the world, Consolation is a reminder that the best things in life are eternal. Boethius must be right: the book is just as meaningful today as it was in the sixth century when he wrote it. --Eric de Place

Die Neuausgabe der „Consolatio philosopiae“ des Boethius (um 480 - 524) beruht auf einer Neukollation aller erhaltenen Handschriften sowie einer Hinzuziehung wesentlicher Textzeugen aus dem 9. und 10. Jahrhundert. Der Text der Opuscula theologica ist die erste kritische Edition dieser Schriften überhaupt.