The Origins of Rhetoric in Ancient Greece (Ancient Society and History) - Softcover

Cole, Prof A. Thomas

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0801851181 ISBN 13: 9780801851186

Publisher: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1995

Synopsis

Is it fair to judge early Greek rhetoric by the standards of Plato and Aristotle? This text argues that it is not, and yet this is the path taken by current scholarship on the subject. Arguing against this view, this work sees early Greek rhetoric as largely unsystematic efforts to explore, more by means than by precept, all aspects of discourse. Replacing these early text by such treatises as the "Rhetoric" of Aristotle, Cole explains, can only be understood as part of a gradual process, as artistic prose came to be disseminated in written texts and so available in a form that, for the first time, be analyzed, evaluated and closely imitated.

About this title

About the Author

Thomas Cole is professor of Greek and Latin at Yale University.

From the Back Cover

Cole sees early Greek rhetoric as largely unsystematic efforts to explore, more by example than by precept, all aspects of discourse. (One might as well term these efforts philosophy as rhetoric, since neither term was current at the time.)

Edition details

• Publisher: The Johns Hopkins University Press
• Publication date: 1995
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0801851181
• ISBN 13: 9780801851186
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 208