Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®
Articles 1 - 2 of 2
Full-Text Articles in Arts and Humanities
Writing For Strangers: Structural Transformations Of The Public Letter, 1640-1790, Shang-Yu Sheng
Writing For Strangers: Structural Transformations Of The Public Letter, 1640-1790, Shang-Yu Sheng
Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects
This dissertation examines public letters in England during the period spanning the English Civil War to the French Revolution, showing how authors employed the printed epistolary form to imagine different relations with the “stranger readers” who constituted the nascent reading public. I employ a formalist approach to analyze the various rhetorics made possible through the public letter’s framed structure, focusing on the assemblages of the narrative positions of letter writer, addressee, and reader. Each chapter describes a mode of the public letter in socio-spatial terms: spectacle, network, community, and public. Building on studies in book history and print culture, this …
Aeschylean Drama And The History Of Rhetoric, Allannah K. Karas
Aeschylean Drama And The History Of Rhetoric, Allannah K. Karas
Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects
This dissertation demonstrates how the playwright Aeschylus contributes to the development of ancient Greek rhetoric through his use and display of πειθώ (often translated “persuasion”) throughout the Oresteia, first performed in 458 BCE. In this drama, Aeschylus specifically displays and develops πειθώ as a theme, a goddess, a central principle of action, and an important concept for his audience to consider. By tracing connections between Aeschylus’ innovations with πειθώ and later fifth and early fourth century conceptions of Greek rhetoric, I argue that Aeschylus plays a more important role in the development of practical principles and concepts of the …