A. Morozova, Master Student
Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv, Kyiv, Ukraine
DOI: https://doi.org/10.17721/1728-2640.2020.147.8
ANATOMY OF EMOTIONS AND FEELINGS IN THE BOETHIUS’ "DE CONSOLATIONE PHILOSOPHIAE"
The article analyses a number of the locations of emotions and related to them emotional words and feelings using the philosophical text of Boethius, a prominent philosopher and translator of Late Antiquity, "De consolatione philosophiae". The declared work has a significant informative potential in relation to the emotional sphere, due to the circumstances of its creation, accompanied by a significant number of emotional reflections made by Boethius, and the chosen genre (the combination of consolatio and protreptics). The ancient emotional tradition left its mark on the Boethius' perception of emotional locations, directing it to the non-monocentric localisation of feelings in different parts of the human physical, spiritual and mental system. The main seats of the emotions are: mind (mens), animus, soul (anima), heart (cor), body (corpus). Among the above-mentioned emotional localisations, the dominant role is played by the mind (mens) both in quantitative (10) and semantic indicators. In the Boethius's worldview, the mind is associated, firstly, with the philosopher's mental health, his ability to maintain calm behaviour in the face of life's disasters, and, secondly, with the concept of the similarity of the human beings to God by their minds. There are both negative (passionate desire, hope, joy, anger, etc.) and positive (joy of heaven, desire for good) feelings in the mind. The second most important emotional location is animus (7), in which the central positive feelings (love and positive hope) are inspired, meeting only in pair with animus. We hypothesise that the latter is perceived by Boethius as an analogue of the Platonic and Christian "soul", the leading centre of spiritual human potentials. Similarly, positive and negative (anger, sorrow, passions, etc.) emotions arise and influence it. The last two locations indicate the physical nature of human – body and heart – and concentrate only on negative emotions – pleasure and passionate desire. Conclusions are made that most emotions have the external nature in relation to men, which correlates to the Stoic emotional tradition.
Keywords: Boethius, emotional system, ancient emotional tradition, Late Antiquity, De consolatione philosophiae, locations of emotions, Stoics, consolatio genre.
Received by the editorial board: 15.12.20
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