Rhetoric and Poetics in Antiquity

by Walker, Jeffrey

• ISBN13: 9780195130355
• ISBN10: 0195130359
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2000-07-13
• Publisher: Oxford University Press

Summary

This book offers a counter-traditional account of the history of both rhetoric and poetics. In reply to traditional rhetorical histories, which view "rhetoric" primarily as an art of practical civic oratory, the book argues in four extended essays that epideictic-poetic eloquence was central, even fundamental, to the rhetorical tradition in antiquity. In essence, Jeffrey Walker's study accomplishes what in the world of rhetoric studies amounts to a revolution: he demonstrates that in antiquity rhetoric and poetry could not be viewed separately.

Author Biography

Jeffrey Walker is a professor of English at Emory University.

Table of Contents

PART I THE BEGINNINGS OF ``POETRY'' AND ``RHETORIC''
Before the Beginnings: Hesiod on Eloquence	3	(14)
The Emergence of Poiesis, Logos, and Rhetorike	17	(28)
PART II ``RHETORIC'' IN LATER ANTIQUITY: A SHORT REVISIONIST HISTORY
Hellenistic Rhetoric	45	(26)
``Rhetoric'' from Cicero to the Second Sophistic	71	(68)
PART III RHETORICAL POETICS: ARGUMENTATION IN ARCHAIC LYRIC
Theognis' Octopus: On Poetry as Rhetorical Transaction	139	(15)
Lyric Enthymemes	154	(31)
A ``Truest Paradigm for Western Lyric'': Pindar, Isthmian 3, and Olympian 1	185	(23)
Argumentation Indoors: Alcaeus and Sappho	208	(42)
Solon Sophotatos: On Lyric Argument Maximal and Minimal	250	(27)
PART IV THE FATE OF ``POETRY''
Aristotelianism and Grammar	277	(34)
Toward Modernity	311	(20)
Notes	331	(36)
Works Cited	367	(20)
Index	387