Abstract
My motivation to write a classic play about Cincinnatus, the famous Roman consul of 458 B.C., arose from my awareness that playwrights and poets through the centuries have seemed to bypass the great achievements of this important Roman consul. His legacy has been overshadowed by the accomplishments of other Roman heroes such as Julius Caesar, whose triumphs in my opinion did not rise to the same level as what Cincinnatus attained in Roman history. In his Early History of Rome, Titus Livy stressed the unparalleled importance of this consul who answered his nation’s call to duty when Livy said, “What followed merits the attention of those who despise all human qualities in composition with riches, and think there is no room for great honors or worth but amidst a profusion of wealth.”1 If the poets and playwrights would acknowledge Livy’s statement concerning this dutiful consul, 1 Livy: with an English Translation in Fourteen Volumes, II of Books III—IV, 89. v they will observe that he deserves more than the monuments dedicated to his honor that one finds in Italy, Britain, and even in the United States of America. Hoping to give Cincinnatus his due regards, I have used Aristotle’s rhetorical theory on philosophical dialogues to compose a classic play befitting this Roman hero in order to further immortalize his legacy as the one who established the Roman values and ideals on which pax Romana (peace of Rome) was based. As part of his reforms to establish pax Romana, Augustus drew on the model of Cincinnatus and on the writings of Livy generally. The play incorporates the principles and qualities of Roman politics, focusing on leaders of the Roman republic who founded the Roman political theater.