The historian of ancient philosophy Marie-Odile Goulet-Cazé, born March 21, 1950 in Gray (Haute-Saône), died on March 15 in a palliative care unit in La Verrière in the Yvelines. With her disappeared a leading Hellenist, who highlighted the decisive importance of the school of wisdom of the Cynics throughout Greek and Roman antiquity, as well as a central figure in the defense of the humanities within of scientific research.
When the young normalienne, agrégé in classical letters, entered the CNRS in 1978, ancient cynicism aroused practically no attention in France, and very little in the world. Certainly, everyone had one day come across the figure of Diogenes, provocative and rebellious, living in a barrel, harassing the Athenians and masturbating in public – among other eccentricities.
However, this “Socrates gone mad”, as Plato says, was not considered a philosopher in his own right. We vaguely knew, like strange curiosities, these radical protesters who claimed to live “like dogs” (“dog” is called “kunos”, in ancient Greek, “cynics” are “canines”). Despite everything, this strange troop, with bag and stick, camped in the margins of philosophy. Cynicism remained a misunderstood school, underestimated because understudied, and vice versa.
Study of Neoplatonism
It took the patience, skill and tenacity of an outstanding researcher, coupled with a relentless worker, to gradually bring out from the shadows a forgotten philosophical continent. In particular, she listed all the names of the ancient cynics, scrutinized the testimonies, analyzed the texts, edited and translated the fragments shedding light on their doctrine. His first book, The Cynic Ascesis (Vrin, 1986), already makes it clear how the extravagant Diogenes methodically embodies a doctrine – a coherent and complete subversion of the so-called “civilized” order, rather than a series of gratuitous acts. .
By tracking testimonies, texts and clues of all kinds, Marie-Odile Goulet-Cazé has not only made it possible to know more than a hundred figures of ancient cynics and to discern the main features of their teaching. It has made it possible to observe, from Athens to Rome, a real influence of cynics where it was not expected. His many works, including Old Cynicism and its Extensions (PUF, 1993), or Cynicism and Christianity in Antiquity (Vrin, 2014), indeed deepen the analysis of the interactions, multiple and unexplored, between the lessons of the cynics and those of the Stoics on the one hand, of the Christians on the other.
Alongside this highlighting of the Cynic heritage, Marie-Odile Goulet-Cazé also contributed to scholarly knowledge of the theory of action among the Stoics, to which she devoted a seminar from 2004 to 2010, and especially in the study of Neoplatonism, through her constant participation in the work on Porphyry carried out at the Jean-Pépin Center of the CNRS, of which she assumed the direction (La Vie de Plotin, two volumes, 1982 and 1992, Sentences, 2005, L’Antre Nymphs in the Odyssey, 2019, all published by Vrin). The concern for pedagogy constantly inhabiting her, she also led, for Le Livre de poche, a very useful annotated translation of the Lives and doctrines of the illustrious philosophers (1999), the manual of Diogenes Laërce, which remains indispensable.
Generosity and tenacity
Throughout her career at the CNRS, where she has assumed numerous institutional responsibilities, she has constantly defended the humanities, research in Greek and Latin philosophy, and more broadly the scholarly study of ancient doctrines. The same spirit of rigor and openness presides over the work carried out by the couple she formed with Richard Goulet, whether it be the monumental Dictionary of Ancient Philosophers (CNRS, 7 volumes from 1989 to 2003), or the “Texts and Traditions” collection, which they managed together at Vrin with Philippe Hoffmann. Since 2001, more than thirty volumes have been published there, combining Greek, Latin, Hebrew, Arabic, Syriac texts…
Those who have had the chance to work with Marie-Odile Goulet-Cazé can testify to her enthusiasm, her outspokenness, her generosity and her tenacity. His open-mindedness, extremely rare among specialists. From his demand for clarity and unwavering courage. The long ordeal of illness has not affected any of these qualities. They continue to inhabit his work, considerable, and to be discovered.
