Un libro di chiacchiere? Discorsi, carte e amicizia nel Sermonum liber di Orazio

This paper, by following the asystematic way of expression typical of Horace’s satire, investigates the concept of sermo (literally “discourse”) as employed by Horace in his first satirical collection (the Sermonum liber). On the one hand, “discourse” is a highly effective communicative medium, which the young poet uses with great finesse to build a complex web of relationships with his privileged readers. On the other hand, “discourse” is a poetic force of great expansive capacity, which can easily escape the poet’s control and become endless chatter and text (even on paper). The consequence risks being an excessive and careless number of verses, contrary to the post-neoteric aesthetic canons of contemporary poetry that Horace respects (in which Vergil’s Eclogues play a key role). These various themes intertwine and develop freely throughout the satirical volume, finding a turning point in the fourth satire, and then coming to conclusion in the tenth satire, in which social relations and friendship are discussed by Horace in a close connection with critical-literary values. Some aspects of Horace’s evaluation of the literary works of Fundanius, Pollio, Varius, and, in particular, Virgil are analyzed and clarified (satire 1,10,40-45).