Refined vs. Middling Styles in the Lincoln Reminiscence: Comparing the Rhetoric of Formality and Familiarity

Rhetoric Review Oct 2014

Refined vs. Middling Styles in the Lincoln Reminiscence: Comparing the Rhetoric of Formality and Familiarity

David S. Kaufer Carnegie Mellon University ; Shawn J. Parry-Giles

Abstract

This essay discusses the competing rhetorical styles of two volumes that appeared in the 1880s to remember Abraham Lincoln. One volume, edited by Alan Thorndike Rice, remembered Lincoln in a refined-official style. A second volume, by William Herndon and Jesse Weik, captured Lincoln in a middling-vernacular style. Using automatic coding and close reading, the authors show that Herndon-Weik’s middling-vernacular style put a focus on the “personal” Lincoln. Rice’s essayists, instead, featured an “official” Lincoln set apart from the everyday man. The authors argue that these contrasts were a contributing factor to the different critical reception they received.

Journal: Rhetoric Review
Published: 2014-10-02
DOI: 10.1080/07350198.2014.946867
Open Access: Closed
Topics: voice and style

Citation Context

Cited by in this index (0)

No articles in this index cite this work.

Cites in this index (1)

Parry-Giles et al. (2012)

Lincoln Reminiscences and Nineteenth-Century Portraiture: The Private Virtues o…

Rhetoric & Public Affairs

Also cites 9 works outside this index ↓

10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199764129.001.0001

↗
10.7208/chicago/9780226316284.001.0001

↗
10.7208/chicago/9780226023298.001.0001

↗
10.4018/978-1-60960-741-8.ch016

↗
10.1515/TEXT.2008.023

↗
10.2307/289108

↗
10.7208/chicago/9780226741901.001.0001

↗
10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195327601.001.0001

↗
Winkle Kenneth J. (2000)

10.5406/19457987.21.2.03

Journal of the Abraham Lincoln Association ↗

CrossRef global citation count: 2 View in citation network →