Cecil Wooten has produced the first translation into any modern
langauage of a key treatise of the ancient world. He provides a
faithful English translation of Hermogenes' analysis based on a
reliable Greek text established by Rabe at the beginning of this
century and includes a substantial scholarly introduction and notes
that will help the reader better understand Hermogenes, his
exposition, and the historical and cultural context in which it was
produced.
Hermogenes' work is both systematic and complex. He outlines, with
almost mathematical precision, seven basic types of ideal forms of
style -- Clarity, Grandeur, Beauty, Rapidity, Character, Sincerity,
and Force -- some of which he breaks down into subtypes. Wooten
explains how the stylistic system works, what it has in common with
other systems developed in antiquity, and the special problems it
presents to the translator.
Wooten also provides two short essays. The first compares the
system of stylistic analysis developed by Hermogenes with those of
earlier critics, in particular Cicero and Dionysius of
Halicarnassus. A single passage of Demosthenes is analyzed
according to these three systems in order to illustrate how
Hermogenes' system best captures its subtleties and nuances. The
second essay discusses Hermogenes' concept of panegyric oratory and
how it relates to the larger problem of secondary rhetoric.
This translation makes
On Types of Style accessible to
classicists as well as Byzantinists, students and scholars of the
Renaissance, rhetoricians, and, more broadly, students of literary
criticism at any level.
Originally published in 1987.
A UNC Press Enduring Edition -- UNC Press Enduring Editions use the
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