"What Need is There of Words?": The Rhetoric of Lű’s Annals (Lűshi chunqiu)
Abstract
This essay introduces Lű's Annals (Lűshi chunqiu), a classical Chinese text with a wealth of material on rhetoric. Not only does the text evaluate numerous examples of persuasion and sophistry, it also lays out a system of rhetorical precepts grounded in a distinctive ontology, that of correlative cosmology. After outlining the cosmology, epistemology, and theory of language of Lű's Annals, I trace how these shape its rhetorical theory and practices. I then consider how the text itself works as a persuasive artifact in the light of its own strictures. The essay closes with some reflections on why this valuable resource for Classical Chinese rhetoric has been neglected.
- Journal
- Rhetorica
- Published
- 2012-09-01
- DOI
- 10.1353/rht.2012.0001
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