Boethius and the Consolation of Philosoph‪y‬

Why did it become one of the most-read works of literature for more than a thousand years?

In this lecture for the Temenos Academy in London, delivered on June 19th, 2019, Stephen Blackwood offers a powerful reading of the ancient Roman writer Boethius and his magnum opus The Consolation of Philosophy. After tracing the ancient Greek roots from which it draws, Dr Blackwood sketches the Consolation’s investigation of how the individual can attain self-possession and true fulfillment amidst injustice, misfortune, distraction, and the inexorable movement of time. He also shows how this perennially influential book, written as its author faced unjust imprisonment and torture, relates the inner life of the individual to the wider cultural renewal with which it is intrinsically connected.

Image: Master of Jacques de Luxembourg, Leaf from a Book of Hours: St. Barbara (2 of 2 Excised Leaves), c. 1465, The Cleveland Museum of Art.