Letter 100, “On the Writings of Fabianus,” is Seneca at his most thoughtful about writing itself — which makes it a fitting milestone at the hundredth letter. Lucilius has read a book by the philosopher Papirius Fabianus and come away disappointed, criticizing its style as too smooth, too plain, lacking the punchy epigrams of fashionable […]

Letter 99 is unusual in form: it’s actually a copy of a letter Seneca once wrote to a grieving father named Marullus, who had lost his young son. Seneca shares it with Lucilius as an example of consolation that doesn’t coddle. His approach is famously bracing — tender about the loss itself, but firm about […]

Letter 98, “On the Fickleness of Fortune,” tackles one of the central problems of human happiness: how can we be content when everything we love can be taken from us? Seneca’s answer is that the person who depends on Fortune’s gifts can never be truly happy, because anything that came from outside can leave the […]