SENECA RISING: EPISTOLARY SELF-RECREATION IN THE AD HELVIAM

Abstract

Following his relegation to Corsica in ad 42, Seneca the Younger wrote the ad Helviam, a consolatory letter ostensibly offering his mother Helvia comfort and support in the face of his deathlike absence through exile. The addressees of Seneca's letters served different purposes for him, and here, because he is addressing his mother, who birthed him, Seneca creates within the ad Helviam a space for rebirth, a means of reviving and repairing a self left shattered by the trauma of exile. Reading Seneca's consolation through the lens of psychoanalyst Heinz Kohut's theory of the ‘tripolar self’, I suggest that in this letter Seneca satisfies his needs for mirroring, for an idealized other, and for twinship, which are requisite for his self-recreation. Through this process, Seneca also provides Helvia with the tools she needs to recreate her own self after the ‘loss’ of Seneca; both son and mother are thus reborn.