Rhetoric and the Unstable World.

Author / Editor
Dobyns, Ann.

Title
Rhetoric and the Unstable World.

Published
Kathleen Dubs and Janka Kaśčáková, eds. Does It Really Mean That? Interpreting the Literary Ambiguous (Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars, 2011), pp. 226-42.

Description
Explores similarities between ambiguity and rhetorical invention in rhetorical tradition from Plato to the twenty-first century. Then discusses three examples of "conscious exploitation of the potential of ambiguity": "Sir Gawain and the Green Knight," CT, and a speech by Barak Obama ("A More Perfect Union")--all of which present material that "allows audiences to make choices." Comments on Chaucer's uses of "controversia" (ambiguity), generic hybridity, and rhetorical questions to compel ethical choices.

Contributor
Kathleen Dubs, ed.
Janka Kaśčáková, ed.

Alternative Title
Does It Really Mean That? Interpreting the Literary Ambiguous.

Chaucer Subjects
Canterbury Tales--General
Style and Versification