Download or read book Rhetoric and Poetics in Antiquity written by Jeffrey Walker and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2000-07-13 with total page 411 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book offers a counter-traditional account of the history of both rhetoric and poetics. In reply to traditional rhetorical histories, which view "rhetoric" primarily as an art of practical civic oratory, the book argues in four extended essays that epideictic-poetic eloquence was central, even fundamental, to the rhetorical tradition in antiquity. In essence, Jeffrey Walker's study accomplishes what in the world of rhetoric studies amounts to a revolution: he demonstrates that in antiquity rhetoric and poetry could not be viewed separately.