Eloquence in 16th-Century England: A Counter View

FAIN: FA-11664-76

Elizabeth S. Dunno
Columbia University (New York, NY 10027-7922)

To study the Ciceronian ideal of the good orator as the good man, utilizing the arts of rhetoric in order to persuade, to teach, and to please as practiced in the 16th century in England. Sir Thomas More affords a prime instance in his History of Richard III of how a skilled author manipulated the arts of persuasion to effect a single desired response. At the end of the century, Shakespeare played freely with the notion that rhetoric could be manipulated for multiple uses--for a "good," a "bad," or a "mixed" response. This study should lead to an acute evaluation of much 16th-century literature.