This chapter reads the cycle of letters to Quadratus and Fuscus of which Epistles 7.9 (Chapter 8) forms the keystone. Epistles 6.11 introduces these two young men as the bright future of Roman oratory, with a fanfare constructed from Quintilian (Institutio 10) and Tacitus’ Aper (Dialogus). Epistles 6.29 is the partner to Epistles 7.9, matching but varying its imitation of Quintilian and Cicero, as Pliny continues playing praeceptor in surprising and arch ways. Epistles 9.36 and 9.40, describing his villa routine to Fuscus, constitute the twin sphragis of the collection. These deceptively simple letters take us to the core of Pliny’s self-styling as man and author, perofmed with pregnant imitations which confirm Quintilian’s very special, and very personal, role in the Epistles.

Epistles 7.9 is an acme of ‘Quintilian in Brief’. Advising young Fuscus how to study during his summer vacation, Pliny rewrites Quintilian’s advice on written exercises (Institutio 10.5), offering a firm riposte to his views on poetry in a virtuosic leçon par l’exemple of textual imitatio. Besides drawing eclectically on Institutio 10 and 11, the letter reaches through windows to Cicero’s De oratore and Pro Archia, pursues Quintilian’s imitations of Seneca the Elder and – in a paroxysm of self-referentiality – appropriates Tacitus’ Dialogus to describe Pliny’s own prose style. An excursus on Epistles 4.14 shows that Quintilian is inscribed into Pliny’s ‘poetry’ letters from the beginning – and that Catullus is far more present in these pages than has been supposed.