Seneca the Younger
c. 4 BCE – 65 CE · Rome
Statesman, playwright, and tutor to the emperor Nero. Seneca is the most literary of the Stoics: his letters and essays are full of practical advice on grief, anger, friendship, wealth, and the use of time. He was eventually forced by Nero to take his own life — an end he met, by ancient accounts, with composure.
Key works
- Letters to Lucilius — 124 letters of moral guidance — Stoicism made portable.
- On the Shortness of Life — Essay arguing life is long enough if not squandered.
- On Anger — Three books diagnosing anger and prescribing remedies.
- On Providence — Why bad things happen to good people, in a Stoic frame.