Theophrastus on Delivery

Bibliographic Data

ID23249495
AuthorsWilliam W Fortenbaugh (corresponding author)
Year2023
Pages269-288
Publication date2023-07-21
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeCHAPTER
VenueTheophrastus of Eresus (SOURCE_BOOK)
PublisherRoutledge (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.4324/9781003419013-13
OpenAlexW4385069026
ISBN9781003419013
LanguageEN
Citations received10

“For the doctrine of delivery (hypokrisis) the work of Theophrastus was epoch-making.” This is the judgment of Kroll in his article on rhetoric, 1 and from one point of view it is certainly correct. Earlier work on the subject was neither plentiful nor inclusive. Prior to Aristotle, delivery had been ignored by rhetoricians (Arist. Rhet. 1403b21), 2 and while the subject had lately become part of dramatic and rhapsodic art (Rhet. 3.1 1403b22-23), there is no reason to think that Glaucon of Teos or any other early writer (1403b26) had offered an exhaustive analysis. With Aristotle himself the situation is little different. He touches on delivery in both the Rhetoric and the Poetics, but his remarks are quite brief and largely subordinate to discussions of style. 3 In contrast, Theophrastus composed a special treatise On Delivery (Diogenes Laertius 5.48), and in so doing gave the subject a measure of importance and independence that it had not previously enjoyed. Still, to claim this much is not to say that Theophrastus was doing very original work or even that he was providing later generations with a useful introduction to the subject of delivery. Indeed, the author of the Rhetorica ad Herennium states flatly that no one had written carefully on delivery (3.19). Scholars like Schmidt and Stroux have been impressed by this statement and suggested that Theophrastus’ work On Delivery was of no great size, 4 and that it did not contain many precepts useful to later rhetoricians. 5 Concerning the size of the work we have the evidence of Diogenes Laertius, who lists On Delivery as a work of one “book” (5.48). But book length is not a fixed size, 6 and in any case it tells it tells us little or nothing about the content and quality of the work. Perhaps we must accept that the work On Delivery will remain something of a mystery, for we have only a few texts that indicate Theophrastus’ views on the subject and none of these texts actually refers by title to On Delivery.

Classical Philosophy and Thought · Computer Science · Families in Therapy and Culture · Historical, Religious, and Philosophical Studies

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