Helen’s argumentative coherence and the didactic element of Gorgias’ rhetoric
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.17533/udea.ef.355225Keywords:
Gorgias, Helen, Argumentation, Education, RhetoricAbstract
I argue in this paper that Gorgias’ Helen is a coherent epideictic speech with a strong didactic element. This didactic element refers to the fact that, by using antilogic and making the weaker argument the stronger, Gorgias conducts the audience’s opinion from one perspective to another. The coherence of the speech comes from the fact that Gorgias employs a commonsensical pattern of argumentation in the first two arguments to prepare the reader for the digressions on logos and love. Even though he never states it explicitly, Gorgias holds the endoxic idea that no one is responsible for an action com-mitted under coercion. I argue that the reasoning structure of the digressions depends on the two previous arguments, i.e., that Gorgias transforms logos and love into a sort of violence. To conclude, I show that Helen is both a coherent and a didactic speech that imparts an antilogical education to the audience.
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