As Andrew Hui remarks in the introduction to A Theory of the Aphorism, the aphorism is a literary and philosophical format that has remained “curiously understudied” (1). There exist plenty of studies on the historico-methodological characteristics of, for example, the dialogue, the treatise and the novel, but the aphorism, despite its persistent ubiquity throughout the world and the ages, has not yet been subjected to such analyses. Hui, a scholar who specializes in the reception of antiquity in the Renaissance but is interested more generally in the transmission and reception of ideas, takes it upon himself to provide an account of the nature of the aphorism. His aim is not to provide a comprehensive historical overview, but rather to examine various characteristics of the format through a close-reading of a handful of aphoristic writers.
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