Letter 7002: Nectar, wine, food, clothing, learning, resources —
Nectar, wine, food, clothing, learning, resources —
with your lavish gifts, Gogo, you are enough for me;
you are a poured-out Cicero, you are my own Apicius [the famous Roman gourmet]:
you satisfy me with words from one side, and feed me with food from the other.
There is nothing you cannot provide.
I come hungry and leave full in every sense —
full of food, full of conversation, full of the particular pleasure
of an evening spent with someone who is both brilliant and generous.
These two qualities do not always go together.
I have known brilliant men who were not generous,
and generous men who were not brilliant.
In you I have found the rare combination,
and I intend to take as much advantage of it as propriety allows.
Dinner tomorrow, then — if you are still asking.
I accept with gratitude, with anticipation,
and with the firm intention of eating your best food
and talking through whatever subject you propose.
Your devoted and perpetually hungry friend,
Fortunatus
Modern English rendering for readability. See the 19th-century translation or original Latin/Greek for scholarly use.
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