ENGL / COMM 4103 RHETORIC & PERSUASION Quintilian: Institutes of Oratory

“[Quintilian’s] endorsement of the oratorical ideal helped to ensure the survival of training in public speaking as the major consideration in the schools in later antiquity and into the Middle Ages” (Kennedy 117) Quintilian and Education:

Quintilian: Major Concerns  Educating the Orator  General Educational Principles: Rhetorical education is the centerpiece and culmination of Roman education. An effective and well-formed orator is the ideal citizen of the Roman Empire  Defending Rhetorical Training  Ignorance of rhetorical theory results in dangerous oratorical practice.  Ignorance of rhetorical theory results in unethical rhetorical practice.

Quintilian: Educating the Orator  Course of Training:  Grammar before Rhetoric Grammar: the art of speaking correctly. Rhetoric: the art of speaking effectively.  Characteristics of the rhetoric teacher:  Parental concern for students.  Good moral character.  Even-tempered disposition.  Clear communicator, patient mentor, exacting instructor.  Encourages questions and criticism  Characteristics of the rhetoric student:  Should accept criticism and not participate in empty praise.  Should pattern themselves after their teacher.

Educating the Orator: Course of Study  Narrations:  Train memory.  Encourage good speaking habits and oral proficiency.  Refutation and Confirmation:  Encourage critical thinking.  Engages rhetorical theory concerning composition.  Praise and Censure:  Develops ethical and moral judgments.  3 Types: Commonplaces, Theses, Real Law.

Training the Orator: Course of Reading  Analysis of literary texts:  Allows rhetoric teachers to “point out the beauties of authors, and if occasion ever present itself, their faults” (373).  Texts should be analyzed for: Methodology Perspecuity Sincerity Rhetorical Devices Organization Argumentation Humor Style Figures of Speech  Which texts?  Both good and bad examples.  Style as well as substance until the student’s taste is fully formed.  Cicero

Untrained orators “make it their boast that they speak from impulse and merely exert their natural powers; and say that there is no need of proofs or arrangements... but only grand thoughts” (381). Defending Rhetorical Education

Defending Rhetorical Training  The ignorant sometimes appear to speak with more force than the educated:  “[W]hat has no art [is often understood to have] more energy” (381).  Subtlety in thought is often mistaken for weakness of opinion (382).  Excellence in rhetorical training is necessary to combat the effects of poorly or untrained orators who are proud of their lack of education.

Educated versus Ignorant Orators  Speak freely  Bold  Copious  Excel in subtlety  Judicious in their choice of language and the development of discourse.  Disciplined and focused.  Rail  Rash  Prolix  Excel in bombast  Focus on style and delivery at the expense of other canons.  Undisciplined and unfocused. EducatedIgnorant

“[L]earning does take away something, as the file takes something from rough metal, the whetstone from blunt instruments, and age from wine; but it takes away what is faulty; and that which learning has polished is less only because it is better” (382). Educated Orators

“[S]eek nothing else but matter in which they may please the ears of [their audience] with senseless gratification” (382). Ignorant Orators

“[T]hey bawl on every occasion and bellow out every thing with uplifted hand... raging like madmen with incessant action” (382). Ignorant Orators

“[S]eldom adhere to the object of proving what they have asserted” (382). Ignorant Orators

“[W]hat is rough is imagined more bulky than what is polished; and objects when scattered are thought more numerous than when they are ranged in order” (382) Ignorant Orators

“A good man skilled in speaking” (Cato qtd. in Quintilian 413). The Ideal Orator

The Orator as Ideal Citizen  An orator should be good:  Using eloquence for evil is a great evil (413).  It would be better if humanity lacked speech and rational thought than to use those gifts for evil (413).  “No man, unless he be good, can ever be an orator” (413).  The attention to moral formation influences educational choices.

“[L]et all of us... Direct our whole faculties, and our whole exertions, to this object [of becoming good men speaking well] (416). The Ideal Orator

 Eloquence versus Rhetoric (416).  The study of morality is paramount (416).  Philosophy offers the best instruction in morality.  Philosophy is also the field of study most removed from real, lived life.  Plato, Aristotle, and the Stoics.  Civil law is also important.  History and literature provide examples for use in oratory.

“The orator... before he falls into the grasp of old age, will do well to sound a retreat, and gain the harbor while his vessel is still undamaged” (425). On Retirement

“[F]rom no other pursuit has greater wealth, honor, and friendship, greater present and future fame, resulted to those engaged in it, than from that of the orator” (428). A Final Thought