Month: March 2017

CCR 634: Legalism, Quintilian, and Structure

On By BrettIn Ancient Rhetorics, Classical rhetoric, rhetoricLeave a comment

Reading Han Feizi, Quintilian, and Arabelle Lyon’s treatment of Daoism, Legalism, and Confucianism, I kept coming back to the role of the individual rhetor and the larger context, as well as the role of different genres and different types of “persuasion.” But I will likely just focus on the first of these.

With Han Feizi, I often noticed the limits of rhetoric, particularly when he discusses how good words–or a good orator–can still end up in trouble. As he writes, after a litany of violent examples, “Why could these worthies and sages not escape death penalties and evade disgrace? It was because of the difficulty in persuading fools. Hence every gentleman 37 has to remain diffident of speaking. Even the best speech displeases the ear and upsets the heart, and can be appreciated only by worthy and sage rulers” (Book 1, Ch. III).

Here, I couldn’t help but think of Socrates–and to a lesser extent Cicero–as well as the book of Ecclesiastes railing against the efficacy of knowledge. What good is knowledge or eloquence when your audience doesn’t care? I feel like this is a question that doesn’t show up as much in other texts that we’ve read.

Countering this, I think feminist rhetoric tends to point to problems with the “available means of persuasion” when unwilling audiences and cultures are critical. Introducing their anthology Available Means (2001), Joy Ritchie and Kate Ronald, for example, describe “women’s rhetoric” as “a tradition that has existed only in the shadows for centuries because women’s writing and speaking have not been gathered together as ‘rhetoric’” (xvi). And while many of the speakers they include were trained rhetoricians or employed deliberate rhetorical tactics, their anthology also includes “women’s writing that may not meet and that may even defy traditional rhetorical criteria and categories— especially concerning ethos, or the appeal of the speaker’s ‘character,’” as this reflects the often marginalized position where women spoke (xviii). They also include many alternative texts, like letters, and topoi that differ from Aristotle’s traditional conception of rhetoric and how people have taken that up. Without tradition audiences, many women rhetors had to use different “available means.”

And I think that’s where “shih” comes in, as Han Feizi, describes, which I gather is a sort of authority from institutional structure. Through shih, people are forced, or forcibly attuned, to listen. Order gets maintained regardless of “who” is governing.

This trust in order felt really interesting, because although Han Feizi also values “tact,” which reminds me a bit like Confucian ren as an ability to read people and navigate governing in a shrewd way, the roles of shih and fa (laws) are extrinsic to the rhetorician at some level.  As Han Feizi argues, the rhetorician does not need to be “worthy” to have this authority, as most people are “average men,” not particularly bad or good. Rather, one should construct a strong structure that can give rulers their authority and not allow them to disrupt things too much if they are not good.

This contrasts a bit with Quintilian who describes rhetoric as the “good man speaking well” and continually emphasizes the moral character of the rhetor, even noting in the later chapters that this is something that they must practice continually. Furthermore, individual training and a close relationship with individual teachers are important, almost forming a familial relationship.

And without being too reductive, I find this to be a more common thread in Western v. Eastern rhetorical traditions as we’ve encountered them. Again, this is not meant to be a totalizing generalization, but many of the traditions we have read–Legalism, Doaism, and Confucianism–seem to value how one relates to elements beyond the individual, while the Greeks and Romans tend to value how the individual navigates certain points as an individual.

On the one hand, the Daodejing values how one aligns with the Way; Dong Zhongshu emphasizes the relationship between emperor, Heaven, and the people; Confucius emphasizes the role of ritual and alignment with tradition and public harmony; and Han Feizi emphasizes the role of law.

Meanwhile, Isocrates values the individual abilities of the student, and Aristotle emphasizes the rhetor’s individual ability to read and intervene with the situation or wield their ethos in a productive way. Cicero and Quintilian also have a similar focus. With Cicero, trying to evoke the emotions of the audience becomes central, and Quintilian recognizes the potential individuality of the speaker as well.

Obviously, complications exist, though. For Confucius, it seems that the individual must spend a lifetime cultivating inner virtue, much like Quintilian’s ideal rhetor. And many on the Greek side, from the Dissoi Logoi onward, recognize the contextual nature of rhetoric, particularly how rules change. More generally, then, I think these readings emphasize the perennial tug-of-war between the individual and kairotic or contextual elements of rhetoric. As Thomas Nagel argues about philosophy, there is no “view from nowhere;” for rhetoric, even as we craft forms and heuristics, this seems equally true–if not more so.

 

CCR 634: Cicero, Part 2

On By BrettIn Ancient Rhetorics, Classical rhetoric, rhetoricLeave a comment

Reading Cicero this week, with the emphasis on arrangement, memory, style, and delivery, I found a few threads that struck me.

First, particularly with Crassus’ interlude, I noticed the return of philosophy. Again, Crassus’ ideal orator feels like a polymath who can also vary their delivery depending on their situation. They have the knowledge of the philosopher, but can also convey that knowledge in ways that philosophers cannot. As Crassus concludes:

“if we are looking for the one thing that surpasses all others, the palm must go to the orator. If they [philosophers] allow that he is also a philosopher, then the quarrel is over. If, however, they keep the two distinct, they will be inferior  in that their knowledge is present in the perfect orator, while the knowledge of the philosophers does not automatically imply eloquence” (266).

While Crassus does seem to treat the ideal orator as somewhat Platonic, a goal we can strive toward more than attain, the role of knowledge feels particularly significant. His tracing of philosophical schools tries to tie his own (rhetorical) craft into these deeper traditions. The space his seeming “digression” takes up is substantial. And, this theme comes up regularly in the overall text. So, I want to focus on the role of knowledge.

Continue reading “CCR 634: Cicero, Part 2” →

CCR 634: Cicero, part 1

On By BrettIn Ancient Rhetorics, rhetoricLeave a comment

While reading Cicero’s De Oratore, I noticed a few tensions. First, the dispute on the “ideal orator.” Crassus and Cicero seem to value an ideal orator with a sound knowledge of all things (particularly law in Crassus’ case). For example, Cicero says the following:

“In my opinion, indeed, no man can be an orator possessed of every praiseworthy accomplishment, unless he has attained the knowledge of every thing important, and of all liberal arts, for his language must be ornate and copious from knowledge, since, unless there be beneath the surface matter and understood and felt by the speaker, oratory becomes and empty and almost puerile flow of words.”

This seems to echo some of the dialogue in Gorgias and Phaedrus, as well as some of what Isocrates says about needing to know something to speak about it effectively–if I remember correctly. Crassus’ focus on law and his elevation of it, considering the Twelve Tables the most important books the orator needs to know, emphasizes a civic component, but he, too, also values a general knowledge. And as the discussion moves forward, the content of this knowledge ranges from more philosophical wisdom, to psychological insight, to the various subject matters one may speak on, like military strategy.

But Crassus still seems to emphasize psychological insight and customs or laws, as when he says, “For the proper concern of an orator. . . is language of power and elegance accommodated to the feelings and understandings of mankind” (20). Or, more definitively, when Crassus breaks up philosophy into three parts–physics, logic, and “the “knowledge of life and manners”–he assigns the third discipline to orators. This theoretical knowledge, deep as well as wide, seems as essential for Crassus as the knowledge of rhetoric that he discusses, such as the Five Canons and the anatomy of a typical speech.

Antonius tends to take a more practical approach, emphasizing early on that he’s not drawing from books but from his own experience in the courts. He seems to value eloquence in itself, though in Book II he also emphasizes that one should study and learn the content of a particular case or disputation. Antonius argues the Crassus’ ideal may be too difficult for most orators, turning them away or getting them stuck studying philosophy outside the forums and courts of more relevant experience. He also values exposure to various things–“that the orator should be a knowing man”–but again, this doesn’t require the rich knowledge that Crassus desires (66).

Instead, Antonius defines the orator in one of my favorite definitions as “one who can use words agreeable to hear, and thoughts adapted to prove, not only in causes that are pleaded in the forum, but in causes more generally” (64). I love the subtle richness of this definition. “Agreeable to hear” points to the role of style and eloquence, which Antonius views as essential to oration. This ability to produce agreeable language sets the orator apart from other experts. And the “thoughts adapted to prove” connects well to the sort of invention practice that Antonius discusses later on. As he notes, he always tries to clarify–in a stasis-like manner–what the issue is, the nature of it, the area of doubt, and how he can best make his proof. This also includes how he wants to emotionally predispose his audience, describing how he leads them through emotional arcs, seeming to ripen them for persuasion.

Indeed, Antonius shows that just because one knows things, like Socrates, one isn’t necessarily persuasive. He points out that the “dry” and “concise” language of the logician differs from the orator who must speak “to the ear of the multitude” (127). And, as he puts it:

“in oratory, whether it be an art or an attainment from practice only, he who has acquired such ability that he can, at his pleasure, influence the understandings of those who listen to him with some power of deciding, on questions concerning public matters, or his own private affairs, or concerning those for or against whom he speaks” (101)

This emphasis on eloquence and “practice” leads to another major tension in the piece: what the “art” of oration is. Here, Crassus makes a nice dichotomy: if dealing with general content, it is not an art; but in terms of methods about speaking, it is. Antonius seems to secure himself more on the latter with his emphasis on eloquence. But even among this, emphasis of art as method, other questions arise, like the role of knowledge as discussed above, the role of genius and natural ability (which both Crassus and Antonius value), the role of humor (a long discussion in Book II), the “labor” of training one’s voice and body (44), the role of model cases and writing (42), or the sort of training one should get more generally.

For example, Antonius  argues that his “first precept” is for students, who have ability, to find someone they want to imitate, but he also discusses that some have a natural originality and don’t sound like others (107-110).

Reading these texts, I’m always struck by their connection–despite differences–between past and present. In light of my focuses above, I find the question of content and the role of individual ability particularly relevant, as both continue to carry into the discipline today, though they are framed more through questions of assessment and not philosophy and art. The qualifying and meta-discussions of rhetoric that characterize many of these texts and scholarship in the 20th and 21st Century seems to thread, like Daedalus’ golden spool, through the often serpentine labyrinth of what Lauer called our “dappled discipline,” past to present.