It is this version of rhetorical positions that has received the widest distribution at different historical stages and the deepest theoretical justification. With slight differences in the views of individual authors, this direction unites the largest theorists and speakers, thinkers of the 4th-1st centuries. BC e. - Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, Cicero. This theoretical direction also absorbed the traditions of Homeric Greece.
In essence, the ancient Greek oral tradition and the heroic epic already laid the foundation for a maturing rhetorical ideal: in Homer’s poems the orators Menelaus and Odysseus are presented, the texts of their speeches are given, the power of their influence on people at decisive moments of the struggle is shown, as well as the most important thing - the choice of tragic and heroic moments in the lives of the heroes, the vividness of the description of events, the most complex construction of plots and the choice of linguistic means. Let us remind the reader that the Iliad and the Odyssey lived in people's memory for a long time and were transmitted orally.
The origins of this rhetorical movement, called ancient, are associated with the name of Homer (VI century BC), who was blind, but saw the distance of times better than the sighted.
VIV-III centuries. BC e. The theoretical positions of this Board, the rhetorical ideal, were formed, they had and still have a strong influence on the fate of ethics, literature, culture as a whole. These positions were supported by both pragmatic Rome and the middle-class
centuries, and the Renaissance, and even our contradictory tragic era.
Let's look at these positions.
1. Goals of rhetoric and oratory Socrates, Plato
Aristotle was seen as serving the good and happiness of people. The power of refuge
Denia as the main advantage of eloquence, skill as an orator
is not about achieving your own goals, subjugating people
yourself (at any cost), but to understand what makes people happy
how to achieve it. Thus, in Aristotle’s Rhetoric there are philosophies
Sophistic calculations of the author about the essence of happiness. He comes to a conclusion
I believe that happiness is multifaceted, it is in well-being, inspired
virtue, happiness is the respect of people, prosperity in the house
a big friendly family, and most importantly, “to have a good friend.”
2. Rhetoric is not only the practice of communication and eloquence
this science has its own subject - speech, it is closely related to philology
sophia, language, logic, ethics, literary criticism. Rhetoric
ka has its own goals, patterns, structure. As part of this
rhetorical direction, the doctrine of canons was formed -
inventions, dispositions, elocutions, etc., connections have been developed with
ethics (tropes, figures), stylistics, prosody, logic, those
oria of upbringing and education.
3. In the same system, it was developed with special care
the ideal model of a speaker as a highly educated individual, you
moral, active, with quick reactions,
sociable.
4. If in a sophistic system the attitude towards the listener is not
was respectful (it’s a pleasure to wrap him around your finger
tion), then the ethics of the ancient ideal required an appeal to listening
respectfully. Speech is a two-way process, the result depends
sieve from both sides.
In classical rhetoric, Aristotle developed a strict theory of speech mentality, speech ethics of an entire people, large social groups and the value orientations operating in them. The speaker focuses on a strong personality. These communication norms guide not only the speaker, but also both sides of linguistic contact, creating an atmosphere of mutual respect. Both parties are interested in a fruitful contact; the listener develops a certain expectation, anticipation, as well as a fear of misunderstanding, disagreement, and disharmony of communication.
These nuances are very subtle, sometimes difficult to detect, but they are the most valuable in communication. It should be noted here that at this level of communication the role of the subtlest shades of choice of words and turns of speech, intonation, and timbre of voice is very high. This is the highest spiritual level of communication in any situation - from oratory to intimate communication with loved ones.
High interest in this dominant contact, the establishment of an invisible connection, the birth of the first threads of mutual understanding would be noticeable in different eras, reflected in literature and the performances of brilliant actors.
The first feature of the ancient ideal is the attitude towards truth,
speakers who belonged to this type of ethical
practice confirmed the firmness of their convictions, their
by __ not 0TST fall from one’s own hard-won understanding
It is known that the great Socrates could save his life, And he preferred death to flight by drinking a cup of hemlock. Demosthenes, known for his philippics, made a similar speech against the Macedonian king Philip II, when he still gained power over Athens. The search for truth and loyalty to it is a
to the spiritual strength of a person, his moral fortitude. In Russian rhetoric, M. V. Lomonosov placed the defense of scientific truth above all else.
But even in classical rhetoric the need for flexible solutions to the “truth-lie” dilemma was recognized, for example: maintaining a military secret, hiding some terrible secret out of compassion, “white lies.”
The sad experience of history indicates that for entire nations there is a voluntary or forced need for lies, officially presented as the truth (totalitarian regimes).
The psychological nature of such a universal, mass lie has not yet received a strict scientific assessment, and its moral assessment is sharply negative. But it can definitely be said that this phenomenon, so frequent in the history of power, has nothing to do with rhetoric in general, much less with the ancient rhetorical ideal. Classical rhetoric, represented by its creators and ideologists, has always opposed lies.
The characteristics discussed above can be classified into the categories of ethos and pathos. Now let us turn to the understanding of logos.
In this area, the tradition did not oppose sophistic norms - neither in the recognition and use of logical laws and rules, nor in the enormous attention to dialogue, to discursive Speech, nor in the skill of choosing various means of language. Nevertheless, we note the most important.
With great attention to the logic of the text, advantage was still given to the structure of linguistic forms, the accuracy of the choice of words, the use of expressive means of language, and the culture of speech.
Culture of dialogue, mastery of argument (without any tricks)
p at ^ ^ axis with literature as an art, with poetry as a literary discipline; The best example of this is Cicero.
l
Linguistic disciplines were widely involved, already p 0
received in the 4th-3rd centuries. BC e. significant development: styles*
grammar, prosody, rudiments of speech theory. A "
The culture of speech and expression of thought were brought to the highest perfection. European connoisseurs of linguistic mastery (Boileau, Schiller, Pushkin and many others) were delighted with the sound of ancient Greek and Latin. Until now, the Latin of the times of Cicero and Seneca (Lucius Annaeus Seneca, 4 BC - 65 AD, author of “Moral Letters to Lucilius”) is considered a model of linguistic culture. There are known estimates in which
It was impossible to further improve Latin after the 1st century.
10. Old Russian traditions
Modern science has a small but sufficient number of sources for the study of the ancient Russian rhetorical ideal, mainly monuments of the 11th-12th centuries. and the beginning of the 13th century. In understanding its originality, researchers rely on both folklore materials and works of fiction, first of all, on “The Tale of Igor’s Campaign”, and finally, on the chronicle.
These examples allow us to speak about the sustainability of traditions, reflections of which are still felt today, despite the three-century loss of independence of Rus' and the irreparable delay in cultural development.
Rus' X-XII centuries. had direct ties with Byzantium - the heir of Greek ancient culture - until its conquest by the Ottoman Empire in the middle of the 15th century. She maintained strong ties with European countries that adopted the culture of the Roman Empire. Connections were strengthened by family unions: for example, one of the daughters of Yaroslav the Wise (he knew eight languages, was nicknamed Os- momyslom, which means “eight thoughts”) was married to the king of Norway, the other, Anna, was the queen of France (turned out to be the first educated queen).
The study of ancient Russian eloquence and its traditions in the 19th century was carried out by A.S. Shishkov, A.V. Meshchersky, S.N. Glinka. N. F. Koshansky, K. P. Zelenetsky, F. I. Buslaev and others. In the 20th century. " mainly L.K. Graudina, G.L. Miskevich, V.I. Annu* 11 "kin, A.K. Mikhalskaya.
It should be admitted, however, that the history of rhetoric has been studied little,” this was noted by the largest thinker in Russia of the 20th century, an expert on rhetoric, Alexey Fedorovich Losev.
Specific works of ancient Russian eloquence are discussed in Chapter 4 - “Rhetoric in Russia.” Let us now characterize its features.
The speaker, as a rule, is a well-known person, invested with trust - a church leader, a prince, a governor. Often he is like a shadow, remains nameless. The speaker's emotions control his convictions. Competence and knowledge are valued above all, as is language - bright, flowery, “decorated”, without any originality.
2 The speaker always expresses a strong position - this is an advantage
but state interests, concern for the church and people. In speeches
STB always contains a teaching or a call, moral statements, a positive example predominates; criticism is introduced in the form of regret or even crying.
3 The speaker defends the truth, his understanding of justice;
Disputes and polemics are rare.
4. Great attention is paid to communication ethics: tracing
There is high respect for the person giving the speech. By
opinion of the people, the speaker should carry his word high, not about
give a speech to anyone, but only to an authoritative audience.
The very handling of speech expresses the speaker’s respect for the service.
Chatels. Judging by the texts that have reached us, the speaker respects me
information about the addressee. In turn, the people express respect not only
to the personality of the speaker, but also to the word itself, wise and beautiful.
The speaker strives for mutual understanding, thinks in the spirit of conciliarity as the complete unity of all listeners and the people as a whole.
5. The speaker carefully prepares for the speech: the fact itself is preserved
misunderstanding of speeches, their repeated copying indicates their
values. One can, of course, assume that the performances
some crops that are not of high quality are not available to us
we've arrived. But if so, then we can assume that in the environment the image
bathroom people - custodians of manuscripts - the level of requirements was
high
6. The composition of speeches, messages, teachings differs clearly -
clarity, clarity. Here is Metropolitan Hilarion giving a speech at
GOORE of Yaroslav the Wise (“The Word of Law and Grace”), he is about
reveals Grand Duke Vladimir and the Russian land, about which
known and heard in all corners of the earth. “Rise up, oh honorable head,
^from his grave!<...>Look at your grandchildren and great-grandchildren!
Look at the city, consecrated with icons of saints!<...>
3 Rejoice and be glad and praise God!” The pathos of the Metropolitan's speech
that - in a call for the unity of Rus', the strengthening of princely power
> Establishing the independence of both the state and the Church.
For eche is generously decorated with appeals, exclamations, anti-
sch"Pa R allelisms and other figures. It is rich in allegorical
with TV Mi > allegorical. The thought is clear, nothing superfluous, highly sensitive
h e Measures. According to the speaker, unity will happen not only
p Ovo 3 STRONG The state, but also through language, through the Christian mi-
3 Rhene. This is how the beautiful Russian land was glorified.
7. In the speeches of ancient orators, one is captivated by kindness, meekness and zeal, gratitude, admiration for the beauty of the world, the faith in the nature of a wise and beautiful word, the power and beauty of eloquence, and a high respect for ancient wisdom, teaching, and education.
The genre diversity of these speeches by Leniy is also highly appreciated: oratorical speeches, addresses of the prince to the soldiers, lives of saints, teachings, letters, historical narratives.
The oratory works of Ancient Rus' are very closely connected with folklore and literature. They seem to grow from one source. “The Tale of Igor’s Campaign” was created for oral use. fullness. Like other works of the heroic epic, it is replete with appeals, as if a conversation with the listeners. Many other works are the same - the spiritual verse “Bo. rice and Gleb", "The Tale of Evpatiy Kolovrat", "Zadonshchina". Even in the XIII-XV centuries. literary works still preserved the oral tradition: “The Tale of the Destruction of the Russian Land”, “The Life of Sergius of Radonezh”.
Rhetoric and the origins of the European literary tradition Averintsev Sergey Sergeevich
Ancient rhetorical ideal and Renaissance culture
In his famous anti-Averroist pamphlet of 1367, “On the Ignorance of His Own and Many Others,” Petrarch discusses the question to what extent a Christian is allowed to be a “Ciceronian.” The word “Ciceronianus” was overshadowed by the reproachful words of Christ heard in a dream by Blessed Jerome nearly a thousand years earlier: “Ciceronianus es, non Christianus.”
“Of course,” Petrarch declares, “I am neither a Ciceronian nor a Platonist, but a Christian, for I have no doubt that Cicero himself would have become a Christian if he could have seen Christ or learned Christ’s teaching.”
The conditional mode of the unreal assumption (if only the pagan classic could recognize the teachings of Christ, he would become a Christian) prompts us to recall the words of the late medieval Mantuan sequence about the Apostle Paul: “Having been taken to the tomb of Maro, he shed over it a dew of compassionate tears: “What,” said he, “I would have done you if I had found you alive, O greatest of poets.” In general, the need to posthumously baptize ancient authors is characteristically medieval. Byzantine poet of the mid-11th century. John Mavropod, Metropolitan of the Euchaites, formally prayed in verse for the repose of the souls of Plato and Plutarch: “If You, my Christ, would deign to remove any pagans from Your condemnation,” his epigram reads in a literal translation, “take them out in my opinion.” at the request of Plato and Plutarch! After all, both of them, in word and character, came closest to Your laws.” An example was set in the patristic era. In the time of Jerome, Virgil was often called “a Christian without Christ” for his IV Eclogue, which, however, Jerome himself disapproved of. Augustine, in one of his epistles, reflected on whose souls, in addition to the Old Testament righteous, were brought out of hell by Christ - were they not the souls of the ancient pagans, especially those “who
I know and love them for their literary works, whom we honor because of their eloquence and wisdom”; True, he still considered it rash to answer this question (from a theological point of view, much more daring than the modus irrealis of Petrarch and the Mantuan sequence). And another parallel to Petrarch’s “if” is the words of Lactantius about Seneca the Younger: “Ots could become a true worshiper of God if someone showed him the way.” “Seneca is often ours,” Tertullian said, and the need to turn the unreal conditional period of Lactantius into a statement of fact gave rise, as is known, to the fictitious correspondence of the Roman Stoic with the Apostle Paul, already known to Jerome and popular in the Middle Ages.
What's new in Petrarch's words? Maybe it’s worth paying attention not to the statement itself, but to whom this statement refers to?
In fact, Plato and Plutarch, for whom Mavropod prayed, are philosophers, and strictly idealistic philosophers, with a strong mystical pathos. Plato taught contemplation of spiritual reality and, as it were, anticipated many features of medieval sacred authoritarianism - starting with the utopia of theocratic rule of “philosophers”, who resembled either Western doctors or Orthodox “elders”, to whom A.F. Losev likened them. Plutarch developed a mystical ontology in the dialogue “On E at Delphi” and demonology, which greatly influenced medieval ideas, in the dialogue “On the Demon of Socrates,” and in his moral doctrine he really “came closer to the laws of Christ.” Seneca, about whom Tertullian and Lactantius spoke, is a moralist, like Plutarch; restless and divided in himself, he was clearly looking for some new foundations of morality. Finally, Virgil, who in the IV Eclogue announced the birth of the world Savior and the beginning of a new cycle of time, is the most mystical of the Roman poets. But Petrarch was not talking about a philosopher, not about a moralist, not about a poet, but about an orator, a politician, a lawyer - a lawyer first of all (“or-timus omnium patronus”, “the most excellent universal lawyer” - that’s what his contemporary Catullus called Cicero). In comparison with Plato and Plutarch, Seneca and Virgil, Cicero appears as a man completely “of this world”, without mystical depths, who can cause awe, but not reverence - just as reverence is not felt in himself.
This is how he was judged in quite different times. “As for Cicero,” notes Montaigne, “I am of the opinion that, if we do not talk about learning, his spirit was not distinguished by height.” And Lactantius, who owed much to Cicero in literary terms and who himself earned the nickname “Christian Cicero” from humanists, wrote:
“In his essay on duties, Cicero says that you should not harm anyone, unless you yourself are hurt by an insult... Just as he himself practiced dog-biting eloquence, so he demanded that a person imitate dogs and snarl in response to an insult.”
The lawyerly, judicial eloquence of Cicero is a “dog” for Lactantius, because he is eager to bite the enemy; the pragmatic and everyday mediocrity of the moral position of the Roman orator, opposed to Christian ethical maximalism, is expressively connected precisely with the fact that he is an orator and lawyer. What else can you expect from a lawyer if not a down-to-earth way of thinking!
To this it can be objected that for the era of Petrarch, unlike the era of Montaigne, partly from Lactantius’s, and even more so from ours, Cicero was not so much a solicitor, not so much a lawyer and politician, in general, not so much himself, Cicero, as a mirror, in in which they contemplated the still inaccessible, but so attractive Plato. Already Lactantius calls Cicero “our first imitator of Plato”; but this still sounds not without irony. Less than a century after Lactantius, Augustine, for all his brilliant education, was not inclined to read Greek and thereby anticipated the linguistic isolation of medieval Latin culture, turned to philosophical, and through them to religious interests under the influence of Cicero’s dialogue “Hortensius”; recalling this in his Confessions, he reproaches ordinary connoisseurs who praise Cicero’s language and do not notice his mind (pectus). “Plato is praised by the best authorities, Aristotle by the majority,” notes Petrarch, and in this context the “best authorities” (maiores) are primarily Cicero and Augustine. The cult of Cicero is taken from Petrarch in the same brackets as the cult of Plato and together with it is opposed to the cult of Aristotle - a combination so characteristic of the Renaissance as a whole and universal in its historical and cultural significance. So, let’s assume that Petrarch’s Cicero is “the first imitator of Plato,” the sage who led young Augustine to Neoplatonism, and ultimately to Christianity. Behind Petrarch are the authorities of Augustine and (with a reservation) Lactantius - again, a typical Renaissance appeal to patristics, that is, to Christian antiquity, against scholasticism. Everything seems to be falling into place.
However, with Cicero - the sage as a fact of Petrarch's consciousness - the situation is not so simple. To begin with, it was Petrarch in 1345, i.e. 22 years before writing the pamphlet “On the Ignorance of His Own and Many Others,” who opened the correspondence of Cicero in Verona and was amazed to see before him not a sage at all, but, as he put it he himself, “an eternally restless and anxious old man,” who “chose constant struggle and useless enmity as his destiny.” As for the authority of patristics, Lactantius, as Petrarch well knew, not only exposed Cicero in his insufficiently elevated approach to the problem of revenge and forgiveness. He, Lactantius, posed a question that was quite consonant with the criticism of Cicero as a thinker in modern and contemporary times: the question of the seriousness or frivolity of Cicero’s attitude towards philosophy as such. Lactantius's criticism begins from a comparison of two statements of the Roman orator. In the Tusculan Conversations, Cicero exclaims: “O philosophy, guide of life!” (“Ovitaephilosophiadux!”). But in one of his lost works it was said: “The dictates of philosophy must be known, but one must live according to civil custom (civiliter).” This transformation of the precepts of the “guide of life” into a subject of purely theoretical, purely intellectual awareness, not binding to anything, not interfering with living the same life as all other Roman citizens who are not philosophers live, evokes an energetic protest from Lactantius. “So, in your opinion, is philosophy exposed as foolish and futile?” If philosophy does not transform our way of living, it is not a matter of life, but literature, and there is no reason to call it a “guide of life.”
But Cicero’s position, denounced by Lactantius, is not a product of thoughtlessness, but rather a thoughtful and consistent position; its very inconsistency (inconstantia, as Lactantius puts it) is consistent in its own way. His philosophy is philosophy under the sign of rhetoric, as he himself quite expressively speaks of this through the lips of Crassus in Book III of his dialogue “On the Orator”:
“Philosophy is not like other sciences. In geometry, for example, or in music, what can a person who has not studied these sciences do? Just be silent so that he won’t be considered crazy. And philosophical questions are open to every insightful and sharp mind, able to find plausible answers to everything and present them in skillful and smooth speech. And then the most ordinary speaker, even not very educated, but with experience in speeches, will beat the philosophers with this simple experience of his and will not allow himself to be offended and despised. Well, if someday someone appears who can either, following the example of Aristotle, speak for and against any subject and, according to his instructions, compose two opposing speeches for every matter, or, following the example of Arcesilaus and Carneades, argue against any proposed topic, and if he combines oratorical experience and training with this scientific training, then this man will be a true orator, a perfect orator, the only orator worthy of this name.”
Cicero decisively annexes philosophy to rhetoric, subordinating it not so much to the professional needs of rhetoric as to the fundamental rhetorical attitude of the mind.
Therefore, it is so important that Petrarch, and after him the humanists, chose Cicero as their “leader,” patron and idol; that the question of Lactantius to Cicero is, in general, removed for them. They are within Cicero's position.
What does this position look like in a broad historical perspective, with an eye to the very antiquity about which humanists thought so much?
The Greeks created not only their own culture - specific, historically unique, with its own specific characteristics and local limitations; At the same time, in a dual creative process, they created a paradigm for culture in general. This paradigm, having abandoned the Greek “soil” back in the Hellenistic era, and from the obligatory connection with the Greek language in Rome, remained significant for the Middle Ages, and for the Renaissance, and further, until the era of the industrial revolution.
Significant is not the same as unchangeable. However, until the paradigm was abolished as a principle, all changes proceeded from it, were correlated, commensurate with it. We must clearly see the constant precisely in order to see the newness of the Renaissance.
The Greek paradigm has a very definite structure, and this structure is not similar to the image that stands behind the usual rubrication of our presentations of the general history of culture, including Greek, where “literature”, “art”, “philosophy” and “ science”, as points of a single questionnaire offered to different eras for completion.
What we call “culture”, the Greeks called ???????, actually “upbringing”, that which is transmitted and instilled in the child, ????. In the center??????? - two forces that are in constant conflict, but also in contact, in opposition, but also in mutual correlation: the education of thought and the education of words - philosophy, seeking truth, and rhetoric, seeking persuasiveness. They are closer to each other than we imagine: they have a common root in the archaic mental and verbal culture, and even in the phenomenon of sophistry they demonstrated an inseparable unity. That is why they constantly quarreled. Each of them sought to restore the inseparability of thought and word, truth and persuasiveness on its own basis, that is, to absorb its rival and absorb it into itself. Philosophy claimed that it was, along with all the others, “true” rhetoric: hence the rhetorical studies of Aristotle, the Stoics, and the Neoplatonists. Rhetoric claimed that it, and only it, is the “true” philosophy: we have already seen that for Cicero, a true orator and a true philosopher are one and the same, and among the representatives of the Greek “second sophistry” of the 2nd-4th centuries. we find many similar declarations. In other words, philosophy and rhetoric are not parts of the culture of the ancient type, not its “provinces” and “domains”, which could be demarcated and each could peacefully exist within its own boundaries, perhaps entering into light border disputes. No, the ancient type of culture gives both philosophy and rhetoric the opportunity to simply identify themselves with culture as a whole, to declare themselves the principle of culture. The face of culture is twofold: it is “paideia” under the sign of philosophy and “paideia” under the sign of rhetoric. Duality is inherent in the very basis of the cultural warehouse created by the Greeks and is reproduced along with this warehouse itself. The victory of the “arts” over the “authors” in the transition from the 12th to the 13th centuries, the revenge of the “authors” in the speech of humanists against scholasticism, the dispute between Pico della Mirandola and Ermolao Barbaro - all these complex events in the history of ideas, each of which has its own ideological content, fit into the framework of the old conflict between philosophy and rhetoric, although, of course, they cannot be reduced to this dispute.
So, philosophy and rhetoric are the very heart of culture of the ancient type, and in this heart lives a resurgent contradiction. But fine art, which for us is undoubtedly included in the concept of “spiritual culture,” the Greeks would have hesitated to include in the concept of their own. According to the well-known remark of Plutarch, not a single “capable” young man (“capable” of what? - of course, for activities in the sphere of mental and verbal culture or in the sphere of civil life), admiring the masterpieces of Phidias and Polykleitos, would himself want to be neither Phidias nor Polykleitos. It is curious that in Lucian’s autobiographical work “On a Dream, or the Life of Lucian” it is precisely personification that is contrasted??????????? ????? (“the craft of a sculptor”) - and ???????. The first refers in her speech to the names of Phidias and Polykleitos, Myron and Praxiteles; but only the second represents “culture” (in Lucian’s context, rhetorical culture).
It was at this point, as we know, that the Renaissance departed far from antiquity.
Even Petrarch thought in the ancient (and medieval) way: representatives of any “handicraft”, any ?????, “mechanici”, are excluded from culture, from the world where there are books. “What will happen,” he exclaims pathetically in the same pamphlet, “if people of manual labor (mechanici) take up their feathers (calamos arripiunt)”? Every philosopher, every poet, every learned man must protest against such a terrifying prospect. Vestra res agitur!
To appreciate the revolution produced by the Renaissance, it is enough to compare the place occupied by Vitruvius - also a mechanicus who took up the pen! - in relation to the culture of his own time and in the culture of modern Europe from Alberti to Vignola and beyond.
The same is the contrast of tone in which the names of painters, sculptors and architects are introduced in ancient texts on the history of art - and, say, in Vasari (whose work in other respects provides a fairly close analogy to these texts). For example, Pliny the Elder, who speaks very respectfully of artists on an ancient scale, begins his biographical columns like this: “...At the ninetieth Olympiad lived Aglaophon, Kephisodorus, Friel, Evenor...”, “...The gates of art that were now open entered in the fourth year of the ninety-fifth Olympiad, Zeuxis from Hercules ... "; “...His peers and rivals were Timanthos, Androcydes, Eupompus, Parrhasius...”; “...Parrhasius, born in Ephesus, did a lot there...” Pliny states that all painters who were, are and will be surpassed by Apelles, as well as all sculptors by Phidias; this seems to be said quite strongly, not without rhetorical pathos, but it only marks the superiority of a certain person in a certain type of activity, and in no way the superiority of this type of activity itself among others. The appearance of Apelles or Phidias is an event in the fate of art; It does not follow from anything that this is an event in the destinies of mankind. On the contrary, Vasari describes Michelangelo’s appearance not simply as a triumph of art, but as a reconciliation of heaven and earth, God and people: “The most benevolent Ruler of heaven turned His compassionate eyes to the earth.” This quasi-theological tone is very characteristic of Vasari: for example, Leonardo da Vinci was, in his words, “truly wonderful and heavenly (celeste).”
In this regard, the use of the epithet cfivinus “divine” is important. In ancient usage, this epithet was normally applied to famous masters of the art of speech. For Cicero, for example, Servilius Galba is “divine in speeches” (divinus homo in dicendo), and Crassus is even “god in speeches,” at least according to the judgment of Quintus Mucius Scaevola, one of the participants in the dialogue; Cicero pathetically recalls Crassus' last speech in the Senate as “the swan speech of the divine man” (cycnea divini hominis vox et oratio). The eloquence of Cicero himself is “divine” in Quintilian’s assessment; The irony of Cicero’s speech “In Defense of Ligarius” is especially “divine”; the same Quintilian speaks of the “divine splendor of Theophrastus’s speech.” The “divine” orator and the “divine” poet (the latter, for example, in Horace) stand next to the “divine” sage and the “divine” Caesar; but the “divine” artist next to them is invisible, he is not visible. Things would be different at the end of the Renaissance. Even during Michelangelo’s lifetime, everyone was so accustomed to calling him “divine” that Aretino can already play with this cliché in his well-known letter to Buonarotti dated November 1545, where, after a stream of reproaches and denunciatory hints, he suddenly conciliatoryly concludes: “I only wanted to show you that if you are “divine” (divino = di vino = “wine”), then I am not “watery” (d’acqua).”
The ancients wrote epigrams on works of art in abundance - but, as a rule, not on the artists themselves. In the “Palatine Anthology” there are 42 epigrams on Myron’s “Cow” and 13 epigrams on Praxiteles’ “Aphrodite Anadyomene” - but not a single epigram on Myron or Praxiteles! And now, during the Renaissance, Poliziano himself, the first poet of the Quattrocento, composes an epigram for Giotto’s tomb in Santa Maria del Fiore, beginning with the words:
Ille ego sum, per quem pictura extincta revixit...
(“I am the one through whom faded painting came to life”)
One must feel all the incomparable weight and solemnity of the Latin ille in order to appreciate such a beginning, which repeats at least two famous beginnings: firstly, the apocryphal, but at that time attributed to Virgil, lines that precede the Aeneid:
Ille ego, qui quondam gracili modulatus avena Carmen, et egressus silvis vidna coegi Ut quamvis avido parerent arva colono,
Gratum opus agricolis...;
secondly, the opening words of Ovid’s poetic autobiography:
Che ego qui fuerim, tenerorum lusor amorum...
A poet could talk about himself like that in ancient literature, but it was “out of rank” for an artist. Now the proud Ille ego is pronounced on behalf of the artist.
Here we have a chance to grasp an important detail: the lexical series applied to artists since the Renaissance is taken from the ancient practice of praising poets and especially rhetoricians. (For antiquity, a rhetorician is often superior to a poet: Cicero could have called poetry, in comparison with rhetoric, “a more lightweight form of verbal art”!) The opportunity to call himself “Ille ego” passes to the artist from the poet; the epithet “divine” comes to him primarily from the speaker. Without the “divine” Aelius Aristides and the “divine” Libanius, the “divine” Cicero and all the others, the “divine” Michelangelo would not have been possible. The deification of the rhetorician served as a primary precedent for the deification of the painter, sculptor, and architect.
In this regard, it is worth noting that the comparison of painting, sculpture and architecture with oratory was quite conscious and fundamental for the Renaissance. According to Aeneas Silvius Piccolomini, “these two arts, eloquence and painting, love each other mutually.”
According to old memory, in obedience to the ancient tradition, the arts that deal with material objects and are therefore not “free” are subordinated to the “free” arts and, above all, to rhetoric. But this subordination is friendly, intimacy is preserved in it, and the moment of intimacy is more important than the moment of subordination. “The arts that come closest to the free arts are painting, sculpture in stone and bronze, and architecture,” says Lorenzo Valla in the preface to his “Beauties of the Latin Language.”
The description of the internal division of the plastic arts is adapted, adapted to rhetorical schemes. In this sense, the remark of Ludovico Dolci, which already belonged to the post-Renaissance era (1557), is characteristic: “The entire sum of painting, in my judgment, is divided into three parts: Location, Drawing and Color (Invenzione, Disegno e Colorito).” One cannot help but remember that since ancient times the work of an orator has been divided into lnventio, dispositio et elocutio.
This convergence of manual art and rhetorical culture corresponded, as is known, to a new type of person specific to the Renaissance, who in his own person combined literature and the pursuit of painting, sculpture and architecture: the humanist as an artist and the artist as a humanist.
A classic example is Leon Battista Alberti, a man, as Vasari characterizes him, of “the most refined and excellent morals,” who “lived as befits a man of high society” (onoratamente e da gentiluomo) and mastered verbal culture (lettere).
Now let’s try to ask ourselves the question: where in the ancient tradition do we find an approximation to this, generally speaking, non-antique ideal of a sophisticated person, far from the “low” habits of a professional, living da gentiluomo, but at the same time able to do “everything” on his own; an adept of verbal and mental culture - and a jack of all trades (emphasis on the word “hands”)?
We find it in the region of so-called sophistry, that is, in that zone which is most obviously subject to the supremacy of rhetoric.
Apuleius, Roman sophist of the 2nd century. AD, praises Hippias, his Greek brother, who lived six centuries before him, because he, inferior to no one in eloquence (eloguentia), surpassed everyone in the variety of his skills and abilities (artium multitudine). He tells how Hippius once appeared at the Olympic Games in a magnificent outfit, made from start to finish with his own hands; and the Hellenes, who gathered from everywhere for the games, marveled at this, along with his learning and ornateness. The subject of amazement is studia varia, the diversity of interests and activities of Hippias. Here is the prototype of the Renaissance uomo universelle. We will not find a closer prototype.
If any of the ancients spoke about the plastic arts in a serious and even enthusiastic tone, it was not the ancient philosopher, but the ancient sophist of the late era, a representative of the second sophistry. It is impossible to imagine, for example, that Aristotle, who seemed to write about everything in the world, would speak about sculpture and painting as he did about epic and tragedy in Poetics and about eloquence in Rhetoric. It is even more impossible to imagine some kind of ancient correspondence to Schelling’s “philosophy of art.” The highest and most significant thing that has been said in all of antiquity about a plastic masterpiece is the words of Dion Chrysostom, one of the founders of the second sophistry, about Phidias’ statue of Zeus. Here the artist is described as a teacher and educator of humanity, its “legislator,” and not only its delighter.
It is curious that the most expressive exception in the philosophical literature of antiquity is in Plotinus, by the way, a favorite of the Renaissance: this is his thesis about the intelligible example of the same Phidias Zeus. But something else is also curious: this thesis is found verbatim before Plotinus in philosophizing rhetoricians - Cicero and the same Dion.
The verbal and mental assimilation of the colossal phenomenon of ancient art took place to a large extent in the sphere of late antique rhetorical ekphrasis, which found so many echoes in the culture of the Renaissance.
Generally speaking, for antiquity, the above statement of Aeneas Silvius Piccolomini about the mutual love of rhetoric and painting justifies itself. They were connected by: 1) status????? in contrast to ?????????, i.e., the attitude towards credibility, and 2) the moment of hedonism, so suspicious for all ancient philosophical thought, including even Epicureanism, which was concerned with the minimization of human needs.
Respect for the painter, sculptor, and architect as a “divine” person entered the structure of culture of the ancient type during the Renaissance, entered as something new, which did not exist before; but it entered through an old door - the door of the rhetorical ideal.
Returning to the image of Hippias in Olympia, it should be noted that the ideal of the uomo universelle, so characteristic of the Renaissance (and slightly euphoric), a person who knows everything, can do everything, tries himself in everything - the ideal expressed in Pantagruel's training program - is rhetorical ideal. Philosophy knew, of course, the propaedeutic sciences: Plato forbade entry into the Academy to anyone who had not studied geometry. Philosophy could provide a methodological impulse and a program for collecting and processing facts in the most diverse fields of knowledge: this was the case with Aristotle and the Peripatetics. But the philosopher is almost the opposite of uomo universelle; his business is depth, not breadth: “much knowledge does not teach intelligence,” as Heraclitus said.
A rhetorician is a completely different matter. As Cicero energetically insists through the mouth of Crassus. For a rhetorician is an amateur in the highest sense of the word; his work is not “one”, but “all”, not self-concentration, but the self-development of the personality, not its systole, but its diastole.
When it comes to the Renaissance ideal of uomo universale, it is difficult to avoid such a topic as “the dignity and superiority of man,” dignitas et excelentia hominis. And here we can once again see how precisely rhetoric was the instrument through which the Renaissance defined and asserted itself in the face of the past.
Indeed, rhetoric is the art of praise and blasphemy, "encomia" and "psogosa"; such an approach to all things in the world is an integral feature of a rhetorician.
As you know, in 1195, Cardinal Lothair, the future Pope Innocent III, wrote a treatise “On the Misery of the Human Condition” - an ascetic work as opposed to the spirit of the Renaissance as anything can be opposite to it. However, Lothair intended and formally promised to write another work to encourage the humble - this time on the dignity of man. He did not have time to fulfill his promise: three years later he was elected pope, and he no longer had time for literary leisure. “On the Dignity and Superiority of Man” was written by other, completely different people - the humanists Gianozzo Manetti (1452) and Giovanni Pico della Mirandola (1487).
Of course, even if Lothair had written a second treatise, he would have seen the dignity of man with completely different eyes than his historical opponents. It is also important, however, that in the rhetorical space “psogos” itself posits the possibility of “encomia”, “blasphemy” - the possibility of “praise”. Lothair created a “blasphemy to man”, Manetti and Mirandola - “a word of praise to man”: this is a very sharp ideological and general cultural contrast, but at the same time it is a movement that does not leave the same plane. The inversion of “blasphemy” easily gives “praise”; but, unfortunately, turning back 180° is also easy. “What a miracle of nature man is! - Hamlet exclaims in the second act. - How noble in mind! With what limitless abilities! How precise and amazing in appearance and movements! In actions how close to an angel! How close to God he is in his views! The beauty of the universe! The crown of all living things! What is this quintessence of dust to me?” “The beauty of the universe”, “the crown of all living things” - this is a normal topic of praise. “Quintessence of ashes” is a normal topic of rhetorical censure. Together they create a vicious circle.
Only Pascal, in his discussion of the greatness and insignificance of man as a single reality and a single theme for thought, breaks this circle and goes beyond the mechanical juxtaposition of “praise” and “blasphemy.” Thus began the new world in which we still live.18. Painting, architecture and sculpture of the Renaissance. The largest painters of the Northern Renaissance The brightest page of the Italian Renaissance was the fine arts, especially painting and sculpture. Proto-Renaissance (XIII-early XIV centuries) – the threshold
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In ancient rhetoric, two rhetorical ideals were consistently developed. For speakers - bearers of the first ideal - the main thing in rhetorical activity is persuasiveness, then the truth of persuasive speech, morality for the benefit of society, clarity and orderliness. This ideal is called Socratic.
Another rhetorical ideal is considered sophistical. The bearers and supporters of this ideal are characterized by formal persuasiveness, excessive verbal beauty, magnificence, demanding speech, self-expression and self-interest of the speaker.
Modern rhetoricians believe that there are three rhetorical ideals at work today.
The first of them can be called close to sophistical, but now it is very Americanized, self-promotional, intrusive, such that it has everywhere filled the media and is aimed at manipulating the consciousness of the masses.
Another rhetorical ideal carries within itself the moral and ethical values of the East Slavic, ancient Ukrainian ideal. It is close to the first ancient ideal - the ideal of conviction and truth, the ideal of Plato and Socrates.
The third rhetorical ideal was formed in imperial and Soviet times. This rhetorical ideal is called totalitarian, propaganda.
All these ideals, in modified forms, still live in the world of modern Ukrainian society. And this is natural. It is a pity that together they do not represent a single balanced rhetorically ideal system, in which they must correspond to certain social models of life and behavior of broadcasters. Unfortunately, a modern American rhetorical ideal is now spreading in Ukrainian society, alien to Slavic culture, in particular Ukrainian, which has always had strong traditions of inheriting Hellenic ancient culture. The American ideal is defeating our ideals in the media and popular culture. Ukrainian society has not yet freed itself from the totalitarian rhetorical ideal. The urgent, appealing, categorical, categorical speeches of many politicians are perceived as rudiments of the Soviet era: authoritarian thinking, intolerant monologue speech, linguistic aggression, telephone rights, power of speech, subordination of the interlocutor, etc. All this can be called politicized pseudo-rhetoric.
The Slavic, ancient Ukrainian rhetorical ideal was formed on ancient Greek traditions and Christian moral and ethical values. The characteristic signs for him are honor, nobility, humility, mercy, nobility, obedience, piety, spirituality. These principles formed the rhetorical ideal of love, or the ideal of humanistic rhetoric aimed at achieving harmony in relationships through the means of verbal communication.
In Greek rhetoric, the word love had many meanings:
1. Love is concrete-sensual, erotic. This is passion (pampering), sensual attraction to a distant subject (longing for someone).
2. Love-sympathy (feeling of inner closeness, kinship of souls). Subspecies: friendship, devotion, interest (in science), respect, love of parents.
3. Smart love - respect, intelligence, duty, care.
4. Sensual love - sympathy, pity, empathy. Harmony in rhetoric is a logical sequence of reasoning and
orderliness of speech is a measure of material and moderation of its presentation, a certain speech structure. In ancient rhetoric, harmony was called cosmos and meant “orderliness”, “embellishment”. Hence the modern meaning of the word cosmos (order of the universe) and the word cosmetics (embellishment, orderliness).
Rhetoric teachers have always believed that the mind, feelings, and will must be educated on the principles of goodness, beauty, and harmony. The rhetoric of love prevents conflicts, softens conflicts and disputes, and harmonizes society. Not only speakers, but also all speakers, in particular teachers, politicians, officials, and public opinion leaders should remember this.
The basic requirements for speakers in terms of the rhetorical ideal can be grouped into the following positions:
1. Confession of a certain rhetorical ideal, those principles that determine the chosen ideal, the implementation of the ideal in rhetorical practice through the observance of certain features.
In the system of the Slavic-Ukrainian rhetorical ideal, which developed on the basis of ancient rhetoric in the eras (Baroque, romantic, neo-romantic) of the Ukrainian national revival, the following features were necessary: consistency, clarity, measure, order, balance, endurance, patience, self-discipline, endurance, asceticism .
This rhetorical ideal was dominated by a harmonious trinity:
a) idea, thought, intentions, truth;
b) moral orientation toward goodness, ethics, goodness, justice, humanity;
c) beauty as harmony of content and form, expediency and linguistic perfection.
This ideal developed on the basis of Byzantine-Slavic Christian philosophy, then was supported by the ideas of the Renaissance Western European spiritual culture and reformation influences. It can be assumed that in the 16th century. The Ukrainian rhetorical ideal was determined in its main features (Lavrenty Zizaniy, Pamvo Berinda, Job Boretsky, Ioanniky Galatovsky, Gerasim Smotrytsky, Melety Smotrytsky, etc.) in the context of general reformation changes and the Slavic Renaissance. In the 17th century The Ukrainian rhetorical ideal acquired polemical features and was significantly strengthened by the support of the Ukrainian Cossacks, who acted with armed force in defense of Ukrainian liberties, lands, the Christian faith and their native language (the Liberation War of the Ukrainian people led by Bohdan Khmelnytsky). This is the era of the Ukrainian Baroque, saturated with Western European ideas of humanism, the early Enlightenment in synthesis with the Ukrainian mentality and socio-historical and cultural processes in the already divided Ukrainian lands. The Ukrainian rhetorical ideal flourished in the pedagogical, scientific-educational and social-cultural activities of outstanding rhetoricians, preachers, teachers of the Kiev College, and then the Kiev-Mohyla Academy (P. Mohyla, I. Gizel, S. Yavorsky, F. Prokopovich, G. Kansky, M. Kozachinsky, G. Kalinovsky, A. Kozachkivsky, F. Kokuilovich, K. Kondratovich, A. Kononovich-Gorbatsky, 3. Kozlov). They all taught rhetoric
at the Kiev-Mohyla Academy and colleges and seminaries in cities and towns of Ukraine (for example, Chernigov, Pereyaslav, etc.), they wrote textbooks on rhetoric.
In the XVII-XVIII centuries. a Ukrainian baroque rhetorical ideal was formed with a predominance of cordo-centrism, lyricism, aesthetics, and free-thinking (its features are noticeable in Ukrainian literature from the times of Kievan Rus, the era of I. Vyshensky and Skovoroda and until the end of the 20th century). Subsequent times added their own features to the rhetorical ideal.
The linguicide of the Ukrainian language, constant prohibitions and oppression of all cultural forms of social life in many Ukrainians extinguished the national consciousness, while in others they awakened it, encouraged resistance, strengthened the will, and forced ingenuity in artistic creativity. The Ukrainian rhetorical ideal becomes passionate, strong-willed, figurative, multi-genre, because it is looking for ways to express itself in conditions of prohibitions. It is formed by the language creativity of Ivan Kotlyarevsky, petitions and stories of Grigory Kvitka-Osnovyanenko, poems and especially messages of Taras Shevchenko, notes of Panteleimon Kulish, journalism of Mikhail Drahomanov, historical works and political speeches of Mykhailo Grushevsky, dedications and speeches and poems of Ivan Franko, poetic "fiery language" Lesya Ukrainsky, language discussions of Ivan Nechuy-Levitsky, Mykhailo Kotsyubinsky, Boris Grinchenko, the epistoly of Panas Mirny, the journalism of Elena Pchelka and the work of many outstanding Ukrainian linguistic personalities.
The totalitarian autocratic and Soviet eras gave rise to the "language of power", authoritarian, directive speech, according to ancient rhetoric - "agonal" speech. Modern Ukrainian society strives to get rid of these totalitarian layers, to renew its spiritual and cultural spheres, and therefore prefers constructive dialogue, linguistic understanding, ideas of humanistic rhetoric,
2. The moral duty of the speaker is to be honest, fair, charitable, and open to people.
3. Highly educated speaker. The speaker must have in-depth knowledge not only of the subject of the speech, but also of the problems of the entire course of this discipline and related topics from related sciences.
4. It is obligatory for the speaker to be fluent in the modern Ukrainian literary language, in particular its stylistic system, functional styles and genres, ways and techniques of organizing artistic means for preparing and delivering speeches.
5. Expressive individual language. It would be good if each speaker had his own oratorical style with characteristic individual features of his public speech, and was able to create the desired tonality and flavor of communication.
6. The speaker must be a nationally conscious person and have a positive influence on language practice.
Individual oratorical style includes:
Awareness of the need and education of original language thinking;
The speech-forming style is manifested in the peculiarities of the composition of speech, the construction of phrases, the tendency to use certain words and phrases, and individual artistic means;
Speaker's behavior in the audience; the ability to feel the “center” of communication, to switch the attention of listeners in a timely manner;
Kinesics and facial expressions and characteristic gestures;
Pronunciation and diction techniques, rhythm and melody.
Therefore, someone who wants to become a skilled speaker (orator, Krasnobaev) must take care of:
Education and deep knowledge of your profession and related matters;
A rhetorical ideal that one would like to emulate;
Searching for speakers whose broadcasting suits his taste, from whom he would like to learn, to find his linguistic authority;
Own oratorical style;
Ability to conduct an extended monologue (lecture) on professional issues;
Ability to have a constructive conversation;
Mastery of polemical eloquence, culture of dialogue and polylogue in discussions and debates;
Moral and ethical consideration of an educated and well-mannered person;
The ability to use the treasury of ancient and national rhetoric, the oratorical experience of predecessors and contemporaries (use samples of speeches and texts, rhetorical techniques, stylistic means of the national language).
In this regard, it is impossible not to note the significance, including didactic, of such a concept as rhetorical ideal. This is “a general pattern, an ideal of speech behavior that must be followed.” The rhetorical ideal corresponds “in its main features to the general ideas about the beautiful... that have developed historically in a given culture” (according to A.K. Michalskaya).
The category of rhetorical ideal allows us to consider rhetoric and rhetorical knowledge not only as a way of mastering speech, not only as a way of solving communicative speech problems, but also as a way of understanding phenomena of a higher level - the value system of a certain culture, its general aesthetic and ethical ideals.
In other words, rhetoric in this understanding becomes a means of understanding reality, improving it by harmonizing relationships in the process of communication, as well as a means of personal self-improvement.
Each culture develops special and well-defined ideas about how verbal communication should occur. People, joining a culture, “entering” it, receive as one of its components a certain general model - an ideal of speech behavior that needs to be followed, and an idea of what a “good” speech work should look like - oral speech or written text . This ideal example of speech behavior and speech work corresponds in its main features to the general ideas of beauty - the general aesthetic and ethical (moral) ideals that have developed historically in a given culture.
So, the rhetorical ideal is a system of the most general requirements for speech and speech behavior, historically developed in a particular culture and reflecting the system of its values - aesthetic and ethical (moral).
This means that in the minds of every person – a bearer of a certain culture – there exists and operates a certain system of values and expectations about how verbal communication should occur in a given situation, “what is good and what is bad” in speech and speech behavior. This system is not accidental, but natural and historically conditioned. Therefore, the history of rhetoric can be “told” (and studied) precisely as the history of rhetorical ideals that emerged, established, and replaced each other.
The rhetoric of the sophists: 1) manipulative, monological - “to use a catchphrase, to amaze listeners with unexpected metaphors and oratorical techniques in general, to arouse anger and indignation both in an individual and in a crowd, and at the same time, with the help of convincing artistry, calm human suffering” ( A. F. Losev);
2) agonal, i.e. the rhetoric of a verbal competition, a dispute aimed necessarily at the victory of one and the defeat of another: “A good speaker is learned in the struggle”;
3) relativistic, i.e. rhetoric of relativity: truth was not the goal of the sophists, but victory: “nothing in the world exists, there is nothing stable, there is no truth, there is only what has been proven.”
Thus, the rhetorical ideal of the Sophists: external form (instead of internal meaning), opinion more important than truth, pleasure more important than virtue.
Socrates' rhetorical ideal, basically similar to Aristotle's:
dialogical: not manipulating the addressee, but awakening his thoughts;
harmonizing: the main goal is not victory or struggle, but the achievement by the participants of communication of a certain agreement on the meaning, purpose, and results of communication; all parts of speech form a coherent whole;
semantic: the purpose of speech is the search and discovery of truth, which is not an illusion, but is contained in the subject of conversation and can be discovered.
The rhetorical ideal of ancient classics is associated with the general ideal of beauty that has developed in this culture. Its main features, according to Losev: richness (cf. “say what is important”), brevity, clarity and simplicity, cheerfulness and life affirmation (joy from communication, reigning harmony).
Roman period of development of rhetoric. The rhetorical ideal of Cicero is the ideal of a Stoic philosopher: to suppress all passions, to ignore the ugly in the world, to enjoy beauty and not only and not so much truth as form (speech). No “sudden movements”: better measured, the main flow to the best of the decorated word. That is why the period - a rhythmic, harmonized phrase - became the subject of close attention of Cicero as a theorist of rhetoric and the favorite rhetorical figure of Cicero the practitioner, Cicero the orator. For Cicero, harmony in speech, in the word, is the result of the suppression of affects, the triumph of rhythm, and the fundamental ignorance of all extremes and dark sides of life.
For Cicero, the orator is a citizen; for Quintilian, he is primarily a stylist; the addressee of Cicero's speeches is the people at the forum, the listener of Quintilian's speeches is a narrow circle of the enlightened. These differences in rhetorical ideals reflect the essential features of changing times.
The movement of rhetorical ideas and, accordingly, the change in the rhetorical ideal is directed from ancient Greek rhetoric (the Sophists, Plato, Aristotle) - to Roman rhetoric - the art of “speaking well” (ars bene dicendi - Cicero and Quintilian) and to the rhetoric of the Middle Ages - the beginning of the Renaissance - the art of " decoration of speech" (ars ornandi), when the main requirement for speech became not only its external, formal beauty and grace, but also correctness, errorlessness, for "our soul will understand better what needs to be done, the more correct the language is praise the Lord without offending him with mistakes” (as stated in the Decrees of Charlemagne).
In ancient Russian eloquence, two main genres predominate - the didactic, teaching word, the purpose of which is the formation of ideals, the education of the human soul and body - “Teaching” - and the “Word”, which treats high and general topics - spiritual, political, state. There was no custom of public discussion in Rus', so polemical eloquence was expressed in letters and messages intended for copying and distribution.
Old Russian eloquence is born on the basis of the interaction of a developed folk oral tradition and ancient, Byzantine and South Slavic rhetorical models, and presupposes observance of the basic Christian commandments. The requirements for verbal behavior and speech (word) determined the rhetorical ideal of Ancient Rus': talk only with the worthy; listen to your interlocutor; be meek in conversation; verbosity, idle talk, intemperance of language, rudeness are sins; worthy is speech that conveys the truth, but not blasphemy, free from unkind condemnation and empty, malicious abuse; a kind word is always desirable and beneficial, but strongly opposed to flattery and lies (praise should not be excessive and false).
The origins of the Russian speech tradition and the Russian speech ideal go back to antiquity (primarily to the rhetorical ideal of Socrates and Plato, to a certain extent - Aristotle and Cicero), to the ethical traditions of Orthodox Christianity, and partly to the rhetoric of Byzantium.
These speech patterns fully reflect the value system of Russian culture, embodied in the traditional rhetorical ideal.
The ethical and aesthetic pattern of Russian culture implies a special role for the categories of harmony, meekness, humility, peacefulness, non-anger, poise, joy, and is realized in dialogical harmonizing interaction, rhetorical principles of laconicism, calmness, truthfulness, sincerity, benevolence, rhythmic regularity, refusal to shout, slander, gossip, condemnation of one's neighbor. (According to A.K. Michalskaya)
Comparative-historical rhetoric– a scientific discipline that studies the forms of speech (“system of phrases”) that reflect the form of thoughts (“system of views”) in various cultures. The rhetorical ideal as the main category of comparative historical rhetoric. The concept of rhetorical ideal. Properties of the rhetorical ideal: historical variability, cultural specificity, social conditioning. Essential features of the rhetorical ideal: 1) the relationship between the participants in the speech situation (dialogue / monologue in content and form), 2) the intention of the participants (agonism / harmonization), 3) the subject of speech and the attitude of the participants towards it (relativism / ontologism).
Ancient rhetorical ideal. Classical rhetoric of the Sophists. “Wandering teachers of wisdom” as the first theorists and practitioners of eloquence. Socio-political views of the sophists and their reflection in rhetorical theory and practice. Development of the beginnings of the theory of eloquence. The art of arguing is a new stage in the development of eristics. The rhetorical ideal of antiquity and the speech behavior of the sophists: manipulative (monological), agonistic (competition, struggle), relativistic rhetoric (the goal is not truth, but victory); the dominance of external form over internal meaning; “opinion” is more important than “truth”; “pleasure” is more important than “virtue.” Playing on the instincts of the crowd as a means of sophistic rhetoric, achieving power and necessary material wealth is the goal of sophistic rhetoric.
Sophists(from ancient Greek “craftsman, inventor, sage, expert”) - ancient Greek paid teachers of eloquence, representatives of the philosophical movement of the same name, 2nd gender. V - 1st floor. IV centuries BC e. In a broad sense, the term "sophist" served to designate a skilled or wise person. Today's word sophistry carries a somewhat negative connotation. In classical or ancient sophistry there are: 1) senior sophists, their acme (highest point, peak) was in the 2nd floor. 5th century BC e. (the most famous are Protagoras of Abdera, Gorgias of Leontine, Hippias of Elis, Prodicus of Keos, Antiphon, Critias of Athens); 2) younger sophists, their acme occurred in the 1st half of the 4th century. BC. (the most famous are Lycophron, Alcidamates, Thrasymachus).
SOPHISTIC(from the Greek sofisma - wisdom, cunning, trick) - the direction of ancient Greek intellectual thought. The focus of the representatives of S. - the sophists (the so-called “teachers of wisdom”) were the problems of the theory and practice of eloquence, the art of argumentation, and debate, as well as various aspects of ethics, politics and the theory of knowledge. S. is the art of all kinds of tricks, focusing on winning an argument at any cost, even through deception, violating the requirements of logic, deliberately confusing the opponent, etc.
S. is usually assessed as absolute evil. This is a centuries-old conventional wisdom. Plato defined S. as follows: “This name denotes a hypocritical imitation of art based on opinion, entangling another in contradictions” (Plato. Sophist). According to Aristotle, the tricks of the sophists are “the art of making money with the help of imaginary wisdom, and therefore the sophists strive for imaginary evidence” (Aristotle. On sophistic refutations). G.H. Lichtenberg emphasized: “A person becomes a sophist and resorts to tricks where he lacks knowledge.” V. Hugo characterized S. in even harsher terms: “The sophist is a falsifier: if necessary, he rapes common sense. A certain logic, extremely flexible, merciless and skillful, is always ready to serve evil: it beats the science hidden in the shadows in the most sophisticated way. ... False science is the scum of genuine science, and it is used to destroy philosophers. Philosophers, by creating sophists, dig a hole for themselves. Mistletoe grows on the droppings of song thrushes, secreting glue with which thrushes are caught” (V. Hugo. The Man Who Laughs).
The formation of S. is associated with the peculiarities of the political life of Athens. For the ability to speak convincingly determined a person’s fate. Hence the attention of the Athenians to the possibilities of the living word. Written speech was considered (compared to oral) dead and useless. And this is natural: all fundamental issues were resolved by the people's assembly. This means that the degree of influence on the minds and feelings of citizens largely depended on the art of eloquence. There was another stimulating factor. Athenian legal proceedings were also based on competition: both the accuser and the defender made speeches, trying to convince the judges (who numbered several hundred!) that they were right. It can be considered, therefore, that there was a kind of “social order” for the ability to speak beautifully and convincingly, as well as for teachers of this art and compilers of public speeches, “craftsmen” who could come up with puzzling tricks, make the enemy look funny or stupid form.
In reality, the heyday of S. was several decades at the turn of the 5th-4th centuries. BC, a brief rise in thought, when the sophists really developed ideas related to the art of argument and the ability to persuade through oratory. This period coincides with the “golden age” of Athenian democracy - the era of Pericles.
At the origins of S. stood two great thinkers (whose merits history has never properly appreciated) - Protagoras and Gorgias. Protagoras of Abdera (c. 481 - c. 411 BC), who was called the “father” of S., was a close friend of Pericles, wrote at his request laws for a new colony - cleruchy called Thurii, gave a philosophical “cut” to the amazing according to the strength of the intellect of Pericles' long-term friend, Aspasia. And such a relationship between the leader of Athenian democracy and the main sophist is far from accidental: S. is a very complex phenomenon, but on the whole it is the spiritual child of democracy. In fact, the sophists oriented the citizens of Athens to the fact that any of them has the right to express their opinion on the affairs of the state, talk about politics, etc. It is in this context that the famous aphorism of Protagoras should be perceived: “Man himself is the measure of all things.” . It is usually interpreted as the apotheosis of subjectivism, but in fact the meaning contained in it is completely different: a person can independently judge everything, first of all, of course, about political problems.
The name of another great sophist, Gorgias, is identified primarily with rhetoric. The emergence of rhetoric dates back to the middle of the 5th century. BC e., when in Sicily Corax and Tisias created their manuals on rhetoric (the first to be mentioned). It was from them that Gorgias of Leontinus (c. 480 - c. 380 BC), who became famous in Athens as a famous sophist and rhetorician, borrowed elements of the future theory of eloquence. Gorgias developed special stylistic techniques for decorating the speaker’s speech - Gorgian figures.
Representatives of S. acquired enormous influence in Athens: “paid teachers of wisdom” (as they were called) literally turned into a “plague.” It was to this time that well-known sophisms go back, such as Horned, Covered, You, father of the dog, You are not a man and others. The wide distribution of sophists in Athens is evidenced by the fact that Aristophanes dedicated a special comedy “Clouds” to exposing their tricks. The unlucky hero of the comedy Strepsiades, in order to get rid of debts, turns to the sophists so that they teach his son turn the truth into lies. His son Pheidippides, having gone through the “school” of false tricks, turns his art against the parent who sent him to the sophists, “justifying” the right to beat his father. “Pheidippides: And I can prove that the son of his father has the right to bludgeon... And this is what I’ll ask you: did you beat me as a child? Strepsiades: Yes, he beat, but out of love, wishing you well. Pheidippides: Well, I don’t have the right to wish you well in the same way and to beat you, when beating is the purest sign of love? And why is your back innocent of beatings, but mine is, since we were both born free? The boys are roaring, but the father shouldn’t be roaring? Is not it? You will object that this is all the responsibility of the little ones. I will answer you: “Well, the old man is doubly a child. Old people deserve double punishment, because the mistakes of the elderly are unforgivable” (Aristophanes. Clouds).
The greatest philosophers tried to resist the sophists. It is enough to recall the constant debates that Socrates conducted with them. It is not by chance that Plato brought out many sophists in his dialogues (dialogues “Protagoras”, “Gorgias”, “Hippias the Greater”, “Hippias the Lesser”, “Sophist” and a number of others), where he portrayed the sophists as negative characters, and this the assessment became entrenched in world culture, but Plato failed to refute the tricks of the sophists with the weapon of criticism.
Only Aristotle solved this problem. The creation of logic was conceived by him precisely as the development of methods for refuting sophistic arguments. As Aristotle himself emphasized, he created his logical system in order to give “honest citizens a weapon against the sophists,” to expose their techniques and tricks. It is the logical analysis of everyday spoken language that is the basis on which Aristotle’s logical teaching was created. In his work “On Sophistic Refutations,” he examined in detail the favorite techniques of the sophists: the use of words with different meanings; shifting many questions into one; substitution of the thesis; anticipation of the foundation; mixing the absolute and the relative, etc., thereby creating a “technology” for combating S.
So, it is necessary to recognize that representatives of S. have unconditional merits to science: it was they who, with their tricks, forced the ancient Greek thinkers to turn to a thorough development of the theory of argumentation and logic in general. They raised the art of argument to a whole new level. According to Diogenes Laertius, Protagoras “was the first to use arguments in disputes,” “began to organize competitions in disputes and came up with tricks for the litigants; he did not care about thought, he argued about words” (Diogenes Laertius. On the life, teachings and sayings of famous philosophers). It was Protagoras who created the philosophical dialogue; later it began to be called “Socratic” or “Platonic” - these thinkers gave the philosophical dialogue a special shine, but Protagoras was the first! That is why some researchers quite reasonably believe that in the works of the Sophists, and primarily Protagoras, are the origins of three areas of scientific thought: linguistics, logic and rhetoric.
Today we have to admit that the ideas of the sophists in the history of science were not appreciated. And it is no coincidence that A.I. Herzen considered it necessary to stand up for the “slandered and misunderstood sophists.” In his opinion, the sophists “expressed a period of youthful arrogance and daring.” The sophist “relies on one thing - his thought; this is his spear, his shield,” he has “the unconditional power of negation.” A.I. Herzen wrote about the sophists: “What a luxury in their dialectic! what mercilessness!.. What a masterful mastery of thought and formal logic! Their endless disputes - these bloodless tournaments, where there is as much grace as strength - were youthful prancing in the strict arena of philosophy; this is the daring youth of science” (A. Herzen. Letters on the Study of Nature).
In the period from the 2nd to the 4th centuries. n. e. the so-called second S.
Modern researchers, in particular A.A. Ivin, consider it insufficient to consider S. only as an art of tricks. Sophistry is beginning to be viewed as a special form of problem posing. A.A. Ivin emphasizes: “A distinctive feature of sophism is its duality, the presence, in addition to external, also of a certain internal content. In this he is like a symbol and parable. Like a parable, outwardly sophistry speaks of well-known things. In this case, the story is usually constructed in such a way that the surface does not attract independent attention and in one way or another - most often by contradicting common sense - hints at a different, underlying content. The latter is usually unclear and ambiguous. It contains in an undeveloped form, as if in embryo, a problem that is felt, but cannot be formulated in any clear way until the sophism is placed in a sufficiently broad and deep context. Only in him is it revealed in a relatively clear form. With a change in context and consideration of sophism from the point of view of a different theoretical structure, it usually turns out that a completely different problem is hidden in the same sophism” (A. Ivin. Logic: Textbook). Lit.: Aristotle. On sophistic refutations // Aristotle. Op. in 4 vols. - M., 1978; - T. 2; Herzen A.I. Letters on the Study of Nature. - M.; L., 1946; Diogenes Laertius. About the life, teachings and sayings of famous philosophers. - M., 1979; Ivin A.A. Logic: Textbook. M., 1997 (Chapter 7. Sophisms); Ivin A.A. Sophisms as problems // Questions of philosophy. - 1984. - No. 2; Kravchuk A. Pericles and Aspasia: Historical and artistic chronicle. - M., 1991 (part seven is dedicated to Protagoras); Xenophon. Memories of Socrates. - M., 1993; Losev A.F. History of ancient aesthetics: Sophists. Socrates. Plato. - M., 1994; Nikiforov A.L., Panov M.I. Introduction to logic: A manual for teachers and parents. - M., 1995 (section 2 of topic 2. Logic, rhetoric, sophistry); Panov M.I. Rhetoric from antiquity to the present day // Anthology of Russian rhetoric. - M., 1997 (Chapter 2. How did rhetoric arise and what role did sophistry play in its formation?); Panov M.I. What are sophistry? What is their danger? How should they be refuted? // Buzuk G.L., Panov M.I. Logic in questions and answers (Experience of a popular textbook). - M., 1991; Plato. Gorgias // Plato. Op. in 3 vols. - M., 1968. - T. 1; Plato. Protagoras // Ibid. - M., 1970. - T. 2; Plato. Sophist // Ibid.; Russell B. History of Western Philosophy. In 2 vols. - Novosibirsk, 1994 (chapter 9 of part 1. Protagoras); Dictionary of Antiquity. - M., 1993 (articles: Gorgias; Protagoras; Sophistry). M.I. Panov
SECOND SOPHISTIC- a movement in ancient culture that arose at the beginning of the 2nd century. n. e. in Asia Minor (Smyrna, Ephesus) and developed until the end of the 4th century. Its leading representatives Lucian of Samosata, Aelius Aristides, Dion Chrysostomos, Libanius no longer developed the actual problems associated with sophistry, and the main attention was paid to the improvement and sharpening of rhetorical technique. Representatives of V. s. developed the traditions of Atticism and Asianism in the field of rhetoric. Atticism (from Attica) was focused on strict literary canons and norms for each of the three types of oratorical and poetic speech, dating back to the traditions of the outstanding orators of Athens in the 4th century. BC e. Asianism is a movement that arose in Asia Minor and focused primarily on the fascination with stylistic innovations and formal effects of the art of words.
Representatives of V. s. They devoted a lot of time to developing the classical rhetorical heritage, turning to the so-called canon of ten Attic orators, and sought to influence the Roman emperors with their speeches (Aelius Aristides, Libanius). Lit.: Averintsev S.S. Second sophistry // Literary encyclopedic dictionary. - M., 1987; Borukhovich V.G. Oratory art of Ancient Greece // Orators of Greece. - M., 1985; Kurbatov G.L. Early Byzantine portraits. - L., 1991 (Chapter 2 is dedicated to Libanius); Nakhov I.M. Lucian of Samosata // Lucian of Samosata. Favorite prose. - M., 1991; About the sublime. - M., 1994. M.I. Panov
Sophistry and eristic tricks. The specificity of the logical techniques of sophisms: 1) confusion of concepts due to ambiguity and “ambiguity” (Aristotle), polysemy, homonymy, paronymy, etc.; 2) substitution of the volume of content of the concept; 3) uncertainty of the content of the concept; 4) insufficiently expressed preliminary conditions about the content of the concept.
Eristic tricks as “a more delicate, but also more dangerous weapon” (Yu. Rozhdestvensky): 1) avoidance of the topic: multiple questions, questions “for fools”, subversion of contradictions, questions to change the scope of the concept being discussed; 2) change in attitude to the topic: objection in advance, false suspicion, categorical disagreement, authoritarian position, getting personal, “ladies’ argument” (illogical transition to another topic), imposed investigation, “sifting the facts,” constructing suspicions, playing with hyperbole and litotes , ironic repetition; 3) destruction of the speaker’s position: changing the subject of discussion, tabooing the discussion of the topic, insinuation, changing the assessment, false agreement and indignation with a change in the subject of discussion, switching to accusation, delaying or speeding up the speech with the addition of a new one and “confusing” the listener, false accusation of absence evidence, a false statement about the impossibility of continuing the dispute, false transfer of the topic to oneself, the use of the principle “the fool himself.”
Ethically acceptable / unacceptable sophisms and tricks. Criticism of sophistry by Plato (“Sophist” and “Euthydemus”) and Aristotle “on sophistic refutations”).
PROTAGORUS.“Man is the measure of all things that exist, that they exist, and non-existent, that they do not exist” (in other words: there is only what a person perceives with his senses, and there is nothing that a person does not perceive with his senses.), “How we feel that this is how it really is,” “Everything is as it seems to us.” Affirms the relativity of our knowledge, the element of subjectivity in it. He was taught philosophy Democritus, who took him as a student, seeing how he, being a porter, rationally stacks logs into bundles. The founder of the sophistic lifestyle (traveling with lectures, teaching for high fees, staying in the houses of rich people interested in culture). According to legend, he was a student of Persian magicians. Protagoras was probably the first Greek to make money in higher education, and he was notorious for extremely high fees. His training included such general areas as public conversation, poetry criticism, citizenship, and grammar. His teaching methods seemed to consist primarily of lectures, including exemplary orations, studies of poetry, discussions of the meanings and proper use of words, and general rules of eloquence. His audience consisted mainly of wealthy men from the social and commercial elites of Athens. The reason for his popularity among this class had to do with certain features of the Athenian legal system. Protagoras' doctrines can be divided into three groups: 1) Orthoepia: the study of the correct use of words, 2) The assertion of the measure of man: knowledge, 3) Agnosticism: the claim that we cannot know anything about the gods. Protagoras' influence on the history of philosophy was significant. Historically, it was in response to the statements of Protagoras and his fellow sophists that Plato began the search for superior forms or knowledge that could, somehow, anchor moral judgment.
Plato in his dialogue “Protagoras” puts into the mouth of the main character a well-known myth about the origin of man and human culture. It is debatable whether these were Protagoras's genuine views. Protagoras proclaimed relativism and sensationalism, and his student Xeniades of Corinth, based on the extreme conclusions of Protagoras, concluded that knowledge is impossible. Protagoras laid the foundations of scientific grammar through the distinction between types of sentences, genders of nouns and adjectives, tenses and moods of verbs. He also dealt with problems of correct speech. Protagoras enjoyed great authority among his descendants. He influenced Plato, Antisthenes, Euripides (whose friend he was), Herodotus, and probably the skeptics. Protagoras is the main character of Plato's dialogue and one of the works of Heraclides of Pontus.
The rhetorical ideal of Plato (Socrates)): dialogicity, harmonization, meaning, search for truth. “Sophistic” dialogues of Plato: “Gorgias” - formulation and solution of ethical problems of eloquence. The Phaedrus dialogue is the first guide to eloquence. Definition of eloquence as a special activity and subject of study. Morality (ethics) and beauty (order, harmony) as opposed to chaos; temperance and moral duty. The concept of the “image” of beautiful speech (rhetorical ideal). Fundamentals of the ancient rhetorical canon. Fundamentals of the doctrine of speech situations: addressee and types of addressees, types and types of speeches, their correspondence to types of audience, speaker and his image, time, place, conditions.
Plato intensively developed dialectics, consolidated the understanding of rhetoric as a means of persuasion. Plato's works are highly artistic dialogues: "Apology of Socrates", "Phaedo", "Symposium", "Parmenides", "Sophist", "Gorgias", "Phaedrus". The scientist reproduced the thoughts of Socrates in his famous dialogues. Plato came to the definition of sophistry as imaginary wisdom. Plato contrasts the sophists with genuine eloquence based on knowledge of truth. The essence of this theory is as follows. Before you start talking about any subject, you need to clearly define it. Next, it is necessary to know the truth, that is, the essence of the subject. The speech should be structured like this: introduction, presentation, evidence, conclusions. Refutation, confirmation, and collateral explanations are also possible. Valuable in Plato's theory of eloquence is the idea of the impact of speech on the soul.
Rhetoric of Socrates: Socratic method, irony, antisophicality, maieutics, induction, antimoralism, appeal to a free citizen acting for the benefit of the state. The philosophy and rhetoric of Socrates (for the first time) as actually pedagogical. The main features of his rhetoric: - Irony as an evasion from categorical judgments and a means of comprehending the truth; - Maieutics or the ability to build a dialogue in such a way that the alternation of questions and answers leads as a result of the conversation to the birth of truth; - The principle of truth of speech also determines the ethical meaning of eloquence; - A special role is given to the relevance and expediency of speech. Socratic rhetoric is one of the first examples of heuristic pedagogical dialogue in history. For Socrates, truth is the essence of a thing, its meaning.
Aristotle's rhetorical ideal(“Logic”, “Rhetoric”, “Poetics”). Social government structure as a speech organization of society. Goals of speech. Ethics of the speaker. “The ultimate goal of everything is the listener” (Aristotle). Justice and correctness of society and speech. Aristotle's rhetorical ideal as a development of the ideas of Plato (Socrates). The main elements of the rhetorical ideal: thought-truth, goodness, beauty - harmony.
Aristotle- founder of formal logic. Logical essays: 6 treatises: Categories, About expressing thoughts, First analysts, Second Analysts, Topika, About sophistical deceptions. Developed a theory of thinking and its forms, concepts, judgments and inferences. Aristotle saw the goal of science in a complete definition of the subject, achieved only by combining deduction and induction. Formulated logical laws: identities- the concept must be used in the same meaning in the course of reasoning; contradictions- “don’t contradict yourself”; excluded third- “A or not-A is true, there is no third option.” Rhetorical essays: Rhetoric, Rhetoric to Alexander. Rhetoric: First part is devoted to the principles on the basis of which the speaker can encourage his listeners to do something or deviate them from something, can praise or blame. Second part- about the personal qualities of the speaker, with the help of which he can inspire confidence in his listeners and more accurately achieve his goal, i.e. persuade or dissuade. The third part– about the special (technical) side of rhetoric: methods of expression (about style), and about the construction of speech (including the meaning of humor, pathos, the influence on young and old), analysis of the strength of the evidence used. The work was in little demand due to its “scientific” nature.
Cicero's rhetorical ideal. The beauty of speech (rhetoric) is higher than philosophy and poetry. Rhetorical treatises: Brutus (Brut; 46), De inventione (On finding<материала>; 80), De optimo genere oratorum (On the best kind of speakers; 50 or 46), De oratore (On the speaker; 55), De partitione oratoria (Construction of speech; 54), Orator (Speaker; 46), Topica (Topic; 44) .
Cicero believed that only a highly educated person who has the goal of fighting for the happiness of people can be a speaker. The main thing in rhetorical essays is the theory of thought formation, work on language, speech rhythm, expressiveness, gesture and facial expressions. The simplicity of speech must be filled with sublimity and power of expression. Oratory is endowed with all the advantages of real art. The diversity and constant novelty of art in general are emphasized more than once by Cicero. No matter how much Cicero recognizes classical “correctness” (De orat. III 10, 38-12, 46) and “clarity” (13, 48-51) as extremely important in an orator’s speech, the main thing for him is to speak “beautifully,” namely “ harmonious, detailed, detailed, shining with bright words and vivid images" (14, 52-53). Perfect for Cicero is also that philosophy that speaks about the most complex things “in detail and beautifully (copiose et ornate, Tusc. disp. I 4, 7). And further, Cicero defines the beauty of speech in “a certain freshness and richness”, “importance ", "tenderness", "learnedness", "nobility", "captivating, "grace", "sensitivity", "passion", and the "flowers of words and thoughts" should be distributed in speech "evenly", "discriminately". The main thing is that “the pleasure from the general tone of speech should be “without satiety,” without that novelty that captures at first sight, but “does not delight for a long time,” in contrast to ancient paintings, whose old-fashionedness and ineptitude itself attracts a person. Moderation is what Cicero demands from beauty. Verbal heaps, painted with bright colors, never give lasting pleasure, and the “curls” and “embellishments” of speakers and poets “satiate”, “irritate” the senses (De orat. III 25, 96-100).
A good speech must include wit. It is either “evenly spread throughout the entire speech and is then called playfulness,” or “caustic and catchy,” that is, what is called “wit.” And although no science is required for either playfulness or wit, “jokes and witticisms” can overthrow a person no worse than tragedy. The tragic “inspiration” of such a brilliant orator as Licinius Crassus did not in the least interfere with the fact that he spoke at the same time “cheerfully and mockingly” (II 54, 218. 225-56, 227)402. It is extremely desirable for a speaker to cause laughter, but even here it is necessary to “observe moderation” (II 58, 236-59, 238). The same moderation is characteristic of the “comicism of speech” (II 60, 244), for the speaker is always distinguished from the jester by “the appropriateness and restraint of wit, moderate and rare witticisms” (II 60, 247). Cicero more than once returns to this idea about the moderation of the funny, confirming that “jokes by their nature should not be licentious and unrestrained, but noble and witty” so that they show the “noble character of a person” (De offic. I 29, 102) (A.F. Losev). Cicero: “The ideal speaker is the one who in his speech instructs his listeners, and gives them pleasure and subjugates their will; the first is his duty, the second is the guarantee of his popularity, the third is a necessary condition for success.”
Greek rhetorical pantheon: Peitho (goddess of persuasion) and two Eris (goddesses of argument): agonistic argument (eristics) and harmonizing argument (dialectic).
The movement of rhetorical thought and the development of society. The heyday of Athenian democracy as the time of the formation of ancient rhetoric. “Rhetoric is the child of democracy” (Aristotle). Demosthenes and Cicero as “great tragic symbols” of “the collapse of small republican Greece and republican Rome” (A.F. Losev). The fall of the republics as the decline of rhetorical thought and the flowering of rhetorical form.
Pedagogical rhetoric of Quintilian. Losev A.F.: Quintilian’s work is systematic and strictly thought out, although it is not original. The entire experience of classical rhetoric is taken into account here, but the time of great discoveries in the sphere of this also once great art of living words and living human communication has passed, giving way to summing up, strengthening canons, strictly following models and bringing the former diversity to schemes and formulations. Quintilian devotes individual books of his extensive work to the comprehensive training of the orator from childhood in rhetorical exercises, the division of speech, its logical structure, its decoration with paths and figures, the style of speech and the correspondence of outstanding oratorical qualities to the moral makeup of a person. However, sometimes among practical advice the themes of nature and art (II 19 Butler), laughter (V 13), fantasy (VI 2), style (VIII 1) and poetic language (VIII 3-6, IX 1-3), artistic structure and rhythm (IX 4), imitation (X 2); different types of oratorical styles and analogies between sculpture and painting (XII 10). Then all this material, which seems to have a distant relation to aesthetics, takes on a slightly different coloring.
Quintilian proves that rhetoric is an art, believing that the gift of nature alone is not enough for true eloquence (II 17). Here Quintilian refers to the Stoic Cleanthes with his teaching about art as a signifier of the path and founder of order, so that rhetoric turns out to be a certain science for him, consisting of business and useful rules. According to Cleanthes (II 17, 41), “art is a force that reaches the path (potestas viam afficiens),” the ability to act methodically. No one, says Quintilian, will doubt that rhetoric in this sense is precisely an art. It is important that Quintilian, in order to define rhetoric, gives some classification of the arts (II 18). Some sciences (or arts), according to Quintilian, are theoretical. These are those that require only knowledge and research (in inspectione, id est cognitatione et aestimatione rerum) and do not go into action (such as astronomy). Others are practical, consisting of only one action (in agendo, such is the dance). The third sciences and arts are poietic (from the Greek poieo - I do), real-productive, with the goal of producing one or another product (in effectu) as a result of a certain action. Here Quintilian names painting as an example. Rhetoric, in his opinion, belongs to the second category, although it can also use the other two methods. And if we classify it as one type, then it would be better to call it “active” or “administrative” art (activa vel administrativa). The division into theoretical, practical and poetic sciences and arts dates back to Aristotle.
Quintilian owns all the rhetorical literature that existed before him, and lists it in detail (III 1). Here we find the philosopher Empedocles, who, according to his testimony, was the first to study rhetoric; Corax and Tisias - the founders of rhetoric; the famous sophists Gorgias, Thrasymachus, Prodicus, Protagoras, who for the first time discussed the “common places”, or “Topic”; Hippias, Alcidamanta; Antiphon, who wrote the first defensive speech and rules of eloquence; Polycrates, Theodore of Byzantium; the orator Isocrates, Aristotle, Theodectus, the Stoics and the Peripatetics; Hermagoras, Athenaeus, Apollonius of Molon, Ares, Caecilius and Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Alolodorus of Pergamon and Theodore of Gadar. Of the Romans, Quintilian mentions M. Cato the Elder, M. Antony, Cicero and others.
He divides rhetoric into five parts: invention, arrangement, verbal expression, memory, utterance (or action) (III 3, 1). He divides the speeches themselves into three types: 1) commendable (blameful) or, generally speaking, demonstrative (genus demonstrativum), 2) reasoning (genus deliberativum) and 3) judicial (III 4). Each of these genus is devoted to a large section (III 7-11). Parts of speech are also analyzed in detail: introduction (IV 1), exposition (IV 2), digression (IV 3), sentence (IV 4), division (IV 5). Book V is devoted to evidence; VI speaks of conclusion (1), arousal of passions (2), laughter (3), competition (4), judgment and reflection (5).
The most important condition for the artistic impression of speech, according to Quintilian, is the method of its delivery (XI 3). Quintilian talks a lot and interestingly about developing intonations that would exactly follow the mood of the speaker, about their naturalness, evenness and variety, about controlling your breathing so as to stop not when you no longer have the strength to speak, but where it is appropriate from the point of view from the perspective of speech itself, and in general about constant exercises, a great example of which is the same famous Demosthenes. Quintilian, further, talks a lot about the meaning of gestures for the speaker, body movements and facial expressions. These are colossal resources for every speaker.
Regarding the internal content of the speech, the speaker must remember that with all the variety of affairs he has one and only goal, which he can achieve only through his own labor. This goal is to intervene in the psyche of listeners, for example, judges, to arouse feelings and passions in it, and to be able to control the feelings and passions of listeners. To achieve this, we ourselves must be sincerely moved by these feelings. If we want to make someone cry, we ourselves must feel the object in such a way that we are ready to cry.
Interesting as an example of rich and finely developed Hellenistic-Roman formalism is Book VII - on disposition (dispositio). Discussing verbal expression (elocutio), Quintilian (VIII 1) extols its clarity, purity, correctness and proportionality. He specifically treats about clarity (perspicuitas), born from the direct meaning of words, and about ways to avoid darkness (VIII 2), as well as about decoration (ornatus) (III 3). The decoration should be masculine, not effeminate. It must correspond to the subject. Decoration is opposed to pleonasm and artificiality, and is promoted by clarity, liveliness and brevity or “brevity” (brachylogia), “lively” (emphasis) and “simplicity” (apheleia). Quintilian is concerned with the issue of amplification and its four types - incrementum, comparison, inference, or conclusion, and the connection of different thoughts (VIII 4). And finally, the chapter on paths (VIII 6) is very important. Understanding by tropes “an expressive change of a word or speech from its own meaning to another” (VIII 6, I), Quintilian divides tropes into those promoting greater expressiveness and into decorative ones (VIII 6, 2). He includes metaphor, synecdoche, metonymy, antonomasia, onomatopoeia (onomatopoeia), catachresis (the use of a word in an unusual meaning), and the second - epithet, allegory, enigma (riddle), irony, periphrasis, hyperbat (transfer), hyperbole. (A.F. Losev).
Quintilian is considered the first classic of humane pedagogy. His words: “Father, when your son is born, have high hopes for him, for great hopes give rise to great pedagogy.”
The contents of the treatise on books are as follows: Book I discusses the initial education of a child; in II - training from a rhetorician; books III – VII are devoted to inventio and dispositio (finding and distributing material); books VIII–XI describe elocutio (style) and memoria (memorization); in Book XII, Quintilian paints a portrait of a perfect orator. Although many of Quintilian's technical aspects of rhetoric have become largely irrelevant today, his clear style, common sense, and abundance of examples give his work vitality. Books I, X and XII are especially interesting. In Book I, Quintilian emphasizes the responsibility of parents for raising their son, the importance of choosing nannies and educators, the need to encourage good habits, teach not only Latin, but also Greek, and give food to the child’s mind. Quintilian points out the advantage of schooling over home education, which lies in the presence of a moment of competition, says that the teacher needs special tact and acuity of perception, considers the problems of discipline and the role of games and recreation. In Book X, Quintilian considers the range of reading, which should form the main part of the preparation of a speaker. In this cursory yet comprehensive survey of Greek and Roman literature, Quintilian makes many judgments that have stood the test of time. In Book XII, he insists that only a highly moral and widely educated person can become an orator.
Ancient rhetorical ideal in the history of world culture.
Related information.