Neither Oratory nor Dialogue

Rhetoric Society of America

"Neither Oratory nor Dialogue": Dionysius of Halicarnassus and the Genre of Plato's "Apology"Author(s): Robert S. ReidReviewed work(s):Source: Rhetoric Society Quarterly, Vol. 27, No. 4 (Autumn, 1997), pp. 63-90Published by: Taylor & Francis, Ltd.Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3886107 .Accessed: 30/11/2011 11:16

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Robert S. Reid

"NEITHER ORATORY NOR DIALOGUE": DIONYSIUS OF HALICARNASSUS AND THE GENRE OF PLATO'S APOLOGY

In the first half of On Demosthenes, Dionysius of Halicarnassus' most mature critical essay, he presents the case that Isocrates, Plato and Demosthenes rep-

resent the three finest stylists when it comes to speaking with the diction ap- proved by audiences. In the process of making an argument for the Demosthenic ideal, Dionysius needed to find commensurate speeches by Isocrates and Plato to compare with Demosthenes. For Isocrates, he compared the "most elegant" portion of On the Peace with a portion of an epideictic speech from Demosthenes' Third Olynthiac. It was a good choice. However, for Plato, finding an appropriate "speech" in the philosopher's writing proved more difficult. Of course, we would readily assume that by the first century BCE Dionysius should have felt compelled to use the Apology as the Platonic exemplar. It clearly ranks as one of the most impressive speeches in all of history. For his part, were he not to use it, Dionysius was well aware critics would complain that the Apology presents itself as the ideal choice for this kind of analysis. So in anticipation of this objection and his otherwise obscure choice to use Socrates' funeral oration in the Menexenus, he dismisses Plato's Apology as something other than a true forensic speech and therefore not a viable candidate. He offers the following tantalizingly cryptic reason: "There is one forensic speech by Plato, the Apology of Socrates; but this never saw even the threshold of a law-court or an open assembly, but was written for another purpose and belongs to the category neither of oratory nor of dialogue. I therefore pass over it." (On Dem. 23).

Within his own lifetime Dionysius already felt compelled to respond to charges of "impiety" for committing the sin of suggesting that one could find infelicities in Plato's compositional style. In a letter responding to Gnaeus Pompeius' complaint that, "You should not have exposed the faults of Plato when your purpose was to praise Demosthenes" (Gn. Pomp. 1), Dionysius responded that had he not objectively compared the best discourses of Isocrates and Plato with those of Demosthenes his argument would have been unpersuasive as well as a critical failure.' Dionysius reminds Gnaeus Pompeius that Plato, "wishing to show off his own ability in civil oratory .. . in rivalry with Lysias, the most accomplished orator of the time, himself, composed in the Phaedrus another speech on the same subject of Love" (1). So, in critiquing Plato, he is merely following the lead of twelve generations of other critics like Aristotle, Cephisodorus, Theopompus, Zoilus, Hippodamas, Demetrius, and many others who were will- ing to question the master: "So with the example of many men before me, and especially that of the greatest of them, Plato, I considered that I was doing noth-

RSQ: Rhetoric Society Quarterly 63 Volume 27, Number 4 Fall 1997

64 RHETORIC SOCIETY QUARTERLY

ing alien to the spirit of philosophic rhetoric when I compared good writers with good" (Gn. Pomp. 1). I raise Gnaeus Pompeius' complaint from its dusty obscu- rity simply to point out that challenging Dionysius' questioning of Plato has ancient precedent.

The modern challenge comes from those who disagree with Dionysius' assessment of the genre of the Apology at On Demosthenes 23. They charge him with being the father of the modern "fiction theory." This is the view that the Apology is a "fiction" (Friedlander 157), that it represents an "idealization" of Socrates (Shorey 33) and, as a Platonic fiction, primarily functions as "an outspoken piece of propaganda for the life of a philosopher" (Lesky 520). The opposing view, which accepts the Apology "as a reliable recreation of the thought and character of the man Plato knew so well" (Vlastos, Philosophy 3), makes a case for accepting the essential veracity of the portrait depicted in the defense and for using it as a "touchstone" to assess the philosophy depicted in the early dialogues (Vlastos, Philosophy 4, cf. Allen 76-78). At issue, of course, is whether the Apology is simply Plato's narrative creation or the actual mature thought of the historical Socrates. As reported by Brickhouse and Smith in their recent Socrates on Tral it would seem that the Anglo-American tradition largely has rallied in support of the "essential veracity" view while the European tradition seems generally to have accepted the "fiction theory."2

Rather than rehearsing this debate or some version of the larger Socratic problem, I want to pose the question: By what criterion may this foremost of the ancient scholars of Attic theories of arrangement have questioned the genre of the Apology? In fact, I believe it would be more helpful to locate the aspect of Dionysius' own rhetorical theory that could be applied to the Apology in a way that brings clarification to a Dionysian conception of its genus. As a comparative critic who employed existing systems of rhetoric to judge the merits of a particular work, Dionysius would have used the system of prose economy (oikonomia) as the touchstone of his critical assessment. One of the central tenants of the critical system of prose economy is the orator's control of good diairesis in managing the argument strategy of subject matter arrangement. In what follows I will briefly summarize the Dionysian theory of prose economy, and then demonstrate, through an inductive analysis of the Apology's artistic strategy of argument by way of ring composition, why Dionysius would have felt compelled to declare that it failed to qualify as either forensic or dialogue. I will demonstrate that Dionysius considered ring composition an aspect of good diairesis in the arrangement of subject matter in his own composition, all of which leads me to conclude that Dionysius had theoretical reasons to exclude the Apology in his quest for an appropriate speech to conduct his comparative critique. In proposing to read Plato through Dionysius and Dionysian theory, I am keenly aware that Dionysius' critique is already a meta-language interposing itself between actual Attic compositional practice and later theoretical reflection, but my primary concern is to understand how Dionysius would have read

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the text and only secondarily whether his reading actually describes Attic compositional practice. What becomes evident with even a casual perusal of Dionysius' critical essays is the way in which his system of prose economy expands our contemporary understanding of arrangement and argument strategy in ancient discourse. Therefore, the results of this inquiry probably have more to contribute to our knowledge about the nature of prose economy as an aspect of literate composition, to our knowledge of potential incipient forms of what eventually became controversiae, and to our knowledge of literate aspects of what, elsewhere, I have termed the finished narrative technique in antiquity (1994), than any final adjudication of the Socratic question. But in good Platonic fashion, inquiry into the latter provides a means of purchase with regard to the former.

Dionysius' Critique of the Apology We could wish Dionysius would have indicated the genre to which he would

ascribe the text, but his categorical dismissal makes it quite clear that he views the work as something other than agonistic oratory or dialectical philosophy. This leaves us with several possibilities. Given the popularity of publishing controversiae and other declamatory exercises in which writers offered their take on what a famous historical figure could or should have said at some pivotal moment in their life, we should not be surprised that composing a 'Socratic defense' was a favorite exercise for writers in antiquity.3 The last and longest, Libanios' Declamation, was composed more than seven hundred years after the actual trial of 399 BCE (Friedlander 157). Beside Plato's defense, Dionysius was probably aware of the apologia of Xenophon, Lysias, Demetrius of Phalerum, and other such works.4 Since we know he was quite familiar with the writings of Polycrates (On Is. 20; On Dem. 8), he may well have read the fictive Socratean prosecution composed by this sophist (c. 392 BCE) shortly after the trial. Dihle suggests that it was Polycrates' fictive prosecution that originally provoked the spate of literary responses from the Socratics (178). This last is at least clear in Xenophon's second effort at defending Socrates in the Memoirs of Socrates 1.1- 2. Given the fact that Plato elsewhere suggests that Socrates may have said nothing at his trial (Gorg. 521e, cf. 526e; see Friedlander 157-58), protestations that Plato's fellow citizens might question whether 'he opened with that remark' or 'used that example' (Vlastos, Philosophy 4) may well miss the point.5 That it was an exercise in the genre that later came to be known as controversiae would have been clear to all.

If Dionysius viewed the Apology as something other then a compositional precursor of an exercise in controversiae, we could assume that he might view it as an extended monologue-speech such as that which rhetorician-historians were accustomed to place on the lips of "historical" characters in order to show how the virtuous prevailed over the ignoble. As the author of the twenty-volume History ofArchaic Rome, Dionysius was well aware of this genre of speech. He considered himself an authority on historiography and, in particular, a master at


creating speeches as an historical fiction in which the historian is concerned with portraying a coherent image, one that matches both the particulars of the occasion and the ideal of the tradition. Sacks finds that Dionysius' On Imitation should definitely be taken as a statement on his view of the task of historiography, but only an historiography that affords its author the opportunity to com- pose oratorical addresses (67).6 Protestations of Polybius notwithstanding, the rhetorical creation of "speeches" in first century Greek historiography was customarily viewed as an appropriate presentation of the "historical facts" and given full parity with the other narrative efforts at recounting what happened (Gabba 69).

With this in mind, one would expect that Dionysius might have demurred at comparing the Apology with an actual forensic speech, but would still have re- spected a masterful example of historical recreation. Yet the tone of his reply suggests otherwise: "this [discourse] never saw even the threshold of a law- court or an open assembly." The sense of summary authority conveyed by this remark suggests the tone and voice of the art critic pronouncing a forgery and one that clearly falls short of evoking awe at the resemblance. That Dionysius might assume such a voice should come as no surprise since, among his other talents, he was an able source critic. This is the same voice we find in On Dinarchus where he corrects Callimachus, the librarian in Alexandria, and the Stoic scholars in Pergamum for being misled in their attribution of several spu- rious speeches to the Attic orator, Dinarchus.7

The problem with all of this is that it is too speculative, offering only educated guesses and chasing scholarly phantoms concerning an otherwise bold but passing comment. In other words, it is not enough to suggest that, because he as- cribed to what we would call the "fiction" theory, he viewed the Apology as functionally foreshadowing what eventually became controversiae. If this was actually Dionysius' reason for "passing over" the work, then he would have felt equally compelled to reject the funeral speech in the Menexenus as a valid example of the genre of epitaphios logos. If the issue was merely the Socratic question, then none of the Socratic speeches within the Platonic canon would have been commensurate with a "real" speech by Demosthenes. Furthermore, the oration he does choose from the Menexenus does not pass his "threshold" test either. It was not delivered as an actual epitaphios logos, but offered in conversation as a kind of stock, fill-in-the-blank epidiectic eulogy taught and memorized under the tutelage of his teacher Aspasia.8 For Dionysius, there must have been something about the form of the Apology itself that problematized it as an example of oratory, or for that matter, dialectic. Therefore, rather than offering any further educated guesses as to what genre Dionysius may have thought the Apology actually was, I think it would be more helpful to determine why he considered it neither a work of oratory nor of dialogue.9 To engage in this kind of inquiry we need to consider the text according to the kind of critical systems that are the hallmark of Dionysian theoretical analysis. In this instance, if the subject is generally classed as a matter of evaluating an author's control of genre constraints, Dionysius would normally respond to such questions accord-

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ing to the precepts of the prose economy system. In turning our attention to Dionysius' critical use of this system, the "subjective" aspect of our inquiry rests on much firmer ground. For throughout his oeuvre, whenever the topic turns to an author's appropriate management of subject matter within a genre, Dionysius begins by predicating his comparative analysis on the basis of the theory of prose economy.

Dionysius' Theory of Prose Oikonomia At best, the rhetorical theory of oikonomia has had a shadow existence in the

rhetorical tradition. Quintilian states that "Hermagoras places judgment, division, order and everything relating to expression under the heading of economy [oikonomia], a Greek word meaning the management of domestic affairs which is applied metaphorically to oratory and has no Latin equivalent" (3.3.9). At a second reference to the concept, Quintilian describes it as the strategic awareness of managing the choices in structuring an argument and then summarizes the facility by analogy with a military simile: "This gift of arrangement is to oratory what generalship is to war. The skilled commander will know how to distribute his forces for battle, what troops he should keep back to garrison forts or guard cities, to secure supplies, or guard communications, and what disposi- tions to make by land and by sea." (7.10.14; cf. the same argument and analogy in 2.13). To depict the management of arrangement in oratory as akin to a military commander's strategy of dividing, distributing, and adapting to contin- gencies with his forces clearly makes of arrangement theory something far different from Aristotle's terse summary of the tasks of taxis.

To gain a sense of the pre-metaphoric dimensions of oikonomia one need only turn to Xenophon's Socratic Dialogue, Oeconomicus (The Estate Manager) in which an elaborate presentation of the "science of oikonomia" as a "branch of knowledge" (2.11-12) is discussed in Platonic dialogue. As Waterfield notes, this is neither a work on economics nor a treatise on agriculture. Instead, its discussion of success in making use of one's assets is controlled by the Socratean quest for a "truly good" model of discipline in one's life rather than looking to models which are merely attractive outwardly.10 The contrast characterized throughout the discourse is that between self-discipline and carelessness (277- 78), suggesting a principle, in this and other works, that is easily extrapolated to all kinds of external management (e.g., management of state, management of military, etc.).11 For example, Isocrates formally conceived what he called his first precept of composition by way of the same metaphoric principle of managing the discipline of one's life, (To the Children of Jason 8).12 By the second century BCE this Isocratean conception had been codified into a system of prose economy and by the first century BCE Dionysius treats it as the fundamental theory of arranging the strategy of one's argument in the style of Attic oratory.13 Dionysius not only discusses and makes extensive critical use of the theory in his own theory of composition, but he also assumes that his reading audience is thoroughly familiar with it as well. Meijering has found extensive references to this conception of oikonomia in the poetic scholi, references that are fully con-


sistent with Dionysius' presumption of the system's general familiarity among rhetoricians (134-225).'4 However, for a sense of the developed theory of prose economy we must turn to Dionysius' critical essays and offer a brief summary of his use of it as a rhetorical system.'5

Dionysius' most significant explanations of the distinctive aspects of this theory occur in two extended texts in which he offers a technical analysis of the historian Thucydides' art of prose economy in handling of subject matter (pragmatoi topoi). The first can be found in an epitome of On Imitation, the portion of which we possess cited in his Letter to Gnaeus Pompius. 6 The second occurrence is in his essay On Thucydides where he provides us with eleven chapters of comparative criticism according to the precepts of prose economy. At Gn. Pomp. 3-6, Dionysius offers five precepts for method in the art of historiography and then uses the principles to assess the degree to which the historians, Herodotus, Thucydides, Xenophon, Philistus and Theopompus are worthy of imitation. For example, he recommends Xenophon's treatment of subject matter in the following manner,

But it is not only for his subjects, which he chooses in emulation of Herodotus, that Xenophon deserves to be praised, but also for his arrangement of his material [tes oikonomia]. Everywhere he has begun at the most appropriate place, and he has concluded each episode at the most suitable point. His division [memeriken] is good, and so is the order [tetaxen] and variety [pepoikilke] of his writing.... Such, then, is his manner in the treatment of subject-matter (Gn. Pomp. 3).

By commending Xenophon's division, order, and variety Dionysius is simply describing the historians craft in terms of the precepts he had indicated in the previous chapter. Briefly summarized, his precepts are as follows: the first task of method in historiography is, "to select a noble subject that will please ... readers;" the second is control of division: "to decide where to begin and how far to go;" the third is control of variety and proportion by choosing "which events he should include and which he should omit;" the fourth is control of ordering, "to distribute [dielesthai] the material of his account and arrange [taxai] each item in its proper place;" and the fifth task presents Dionysius' case that the governing philosophy of historiography should be to serve the moral concern of showing "pleasure in the good and distress at the bad" (3). Note that, in this poetics of historiography, the inventional task of selection of subject flows very smoothly into the compositional tasks of division, variety, and ordering.'7

In On Thucydides, Dionysius offers the following thesis and preview for his extensive discussion of Thucydides' treatment of subject matter according to the precepts of the theory of prose economy:

The defects of Thucydidean workmanship and the features that are criti- cized by some persons relate to the more technical side of his subject matter, what is called the economy [oikonomikon] of the discourse, some-

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thing that is desirable in all kinds of writing, whether one chooses philo- sophical or oratorical subjects. The matter in question has to do with division [te^n diairesin], order [ten taxin] and development [tas exergasias] (On Thuc. 9; Pritchett's trans.).

This statement previews a discussion that takes place in Chapters 9-20 of the essay. Chapter 9 critiques aspects of the historian's practice of diairesis, or division, of subject matter. Chapters 10-12 are devoted to critiquing his practice of taxis, or his ordering and positioning of the parts of the text in relation to one another. Chapters 13-20 analyze Thucydides' method of exergasia, which is to say, his manner of development and balance in the final composition. Meijering has already provided extensive philological analysis of the rhetorical dimensions of this threefold system in her study of Literary and Rhetorical Theories in Greek Scholia (134-62). Therefore, I will simply clarify Dionysius' usage of the terms here with a minimum of argument and illustration from the texts.

Of the three distinctions, exergasia is the least difficult to grasp. It is the artistry of proportion used in developing the treatment of commensurate aspects of the subject in the prose economy of a work. Inappropriate attention to exergasia results in, "either according too much space to unimportant matters, or skim- ming too nonchalantly over those requiring more thorough treatment" (On Thuc. 13). Meijering argues that because Dionysius tends to apply both diairesis and taxis to the text as a whole, exergasia represents economy in the composition of the parts.

Taxis involves order as it concerns appropriate positioning of the sequence of presentation, the distribution and arrangement of each item in its proper place. For Dionysius, good taxis arrays narrative sequence and positions argument development in a fashion that creates an appropriate moral and artistic unity. Good taxis is conscious management of the artistic unity of the pre-selected arguments or episodes of a narrative. In On Thucydides, he offers examples of what he considers flaws in the historian's narrative sequence, but he views the problem primarily as a byproduct of an improper diairesis.'8 He summarizes the distinction in this way, "Whereas Thucydides has taken a single subject and divided the whole body into many parts, Herodotus has chosen a number of subjects which are in no way alike and has made them into one harmonious whole" (Gn. Pomp. 3).

This eloquently phrased chiastic dictum implicates the relationship of good taxis to good diairesis. Here, diairesis simply appears to be the accepted term for the principle by which a narrative is partitioned; i.e., its overarching method of division: "[W]hereas earlier historians divided their accounts either topo- graphically or by means of chronological framework, Thucydides adopts neither of these methods of division" (On Thuc. 9). The result of this confusing diairesis is general frustration with the ordering: "we wander here and there, and have difficulty following the sequence of events described" (9). Thus, the problem of flawed taxis is that it comes about as a result of a prior problem of a poor diairesis. Dionysius concludes, "It is clear that Thucydides' principle is


wrong and ill-suited to history: for no subsequent historian divided up his narrative by summers and winters, but all followed the well-worn roads which lead to clarity" (9).

As Dionysius indicates, prose economy is good form in composition, whether in philosophy or oratory. It is the primary system he uses to compare the treatment of subject matter among the Orators. At On Lysias 15 he commends Lysias' ability to discover and select arguments, but does not commend his taxis and exergasia because it is simply "straightforward and uncomplicated." Isocrates is commended as equal to Lysias in discovery and selection in argument, but his control of division, order, and development are considered superior (On Isoc. 14). Again, where Lysias is said to attempt little artifice in his division, order and development, Dionysius commends Isaeus' clever management (oikonomesai) of subject matter because he writes nothing without employing the techniques of good prose composition (On Isa. 3 and 14).19 Dionysius assesses Attic control of subject matter according to facility in discovery and selection of arguments and the writer's skill at making use of those arguments with agonistic force according to the principles of good prose economy. Dionysius' use of the system for critique in On Lysias serves as a good example. After praising Lysias' control of heuresis and commending his skill in the forensic genre, he devotes the remainder of the essay (16-33) to a discussion of how well Lysias manages (6ikonomeitai, On Lys. 24) the material partitioned as proem, statement of the case, narration, proof, and peroration in the various genres (a set of distinctions Dionysius attributes to "Isocrates and his school;" On Lys. 16). What becomes quickly apparent is that Dionysius operates in a tradition in which the theory of prose economy is the primary system by which proper agonistic control of arrangement is understood. He treats issues of invention as matters of basic selection in argument, but the quality of an orator's strategy of argument, what amounts to the power of the argument, he treats as a function of good oikonomia.

His main exposition of the technical system of oikonomia at On Dem. 51 situates the theory as part of Dionysius' overall system. Dionysius modeled his conception of the "science of word arrangement" (On Arr. 6-9) on the same threefold distinction in tasks found in the existing theory of prose economy20 and offers the following summary as the "rhetoric" he believes he has derived from Demosthenes' practice,

[Demosthenes] observed that good oratory depends on two factors, selection of subject matter [pragmatikon topon] and style of delivery [ton lektikon], and that these two are each divided into two equal sections, subject matter into preparation [ten paraskeuen] which the early rhetoricians called invention [heuresin] and deployment [ten chresin] of the pre- pared material which they call arrangement [oikonomian]; and style into choice of words [ten eklogen], and composition [ten sunthesin] of the words chosen. In both of these sections the second is more important,

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arrangement [to oikonomikon] in the case of subject matter and composition [to sunthetikon] in the case of style (51).

Far from the Aristotelian threefold division of invention, arrangement and style, the Dionysian rhetoric treats issues of invention and arrangement as dual tasks in the treatment of one's subject matter and style. In both contexts he argues that factors of selection (whether heuresis or ekloge) may precede arrangement in order, but that the second factor (whether oikonomia or synthesis) has far greater "potency" in effecting persuasion.2" This way of organizing rhetorical theory places far greater emphasis on the effect of the rhetor's control of the agonistic force of an argument, which is why Dionysius elevates the latter to the place of a fourth "means of persuasion" in his own peroration concerning the Demosthenic rhetorical art: "While it is necessary for the orator to aim at lucidity, vividness, amplification, and good rhythmical composition, above all of these, it is necessary to aim at arousing emotion, evoking character and achieving an appropriate agonistic force of expression, for herein lies the greatest portion of the power of persuasion" (On Dem. 58; my translation)."

His argument-that potency rests in the task of strategically arranging subject matter and the effect of one's style rather than in the prior steps of selection of arguments and choice of words-is a distinctly Dionysian position, but one that makes sense given the first century polemic concerning a true civic rhetoric that was being waged over seemingly mundane issues like word order and types of style (Reid, "Compositional Style" 47-49). In effect, Dionysius defined prose economy in On Dem. 51 as the ability to manage the strategy of arguments pre- viously determined and artistically to structure the result into an agonistically forceful whole. The inventional aspect of structuring the relationship of arguments is separated from the discovery of available arguments, with the latter being reduced to a task of "selection" akin to the selection of appropriate words. It is adroit "arrangement," whether of subject matter (oikonomia) or words (synthesis), that is the true "potency" in the Dionysian art of rhetoric.

This is the operative theory of prose economy at work for Dionysius when he made his comments about the genre of Plato's Apology at On Demosthenes 23. According to this approach, the rhetor's control of arrangement had more to do with "arousing emotion, evoking character and achieving an appropriate agonistic force of expression" (On Dem. 58), something which takes far greater skill than mere heuresis-which is to say, selection among available arguments through topical reasoning. Effective use of pathos and ethos to persuade an audience of the logic of an orator's appeal are central to the Dionysian rhetoric, and given this, I think it reasonable to suggest that Dionysius would have had major problems with Plato's diairesis or strategy of division in the Apology. As indicated above, diairesis implicates the degree to which the author successfully conceived a strategy of arranging arguments in a manner that would invite audiences to take "pleasure in the good and [have] distress at the bad" (Gn. Pomp. 3). Of


course anyone who has read the Apology knows that Socrates' arguments are presented as a masterstroke of irony at the expense of the audience he is otherwise charged to persuade. As a comparative critic who used coherence to the rhetorical systems as his critical means to assess the worthiness of imitating an author, Dionysius would have been compelled to judge Socrates' strategy of argument arrangement an abysmal failure compared to Demosthenes' success. So rather than judge the Apology a failure at diairesis in prose economy, Dionysius opted for the view that comparing it to a piece of Demosthenic forensic pleading would be comparing apples and oranges. Given his criteria of judgment and commitment to systems, it was a wise assessment. The question we face, however, is how he could be so sure that the discourse, as composed, "never saw even the threshold of a law-court or an open assembly." What is there about the theory of arrangement and the diairesis of the Apology that would have caused Dionysius to view it as something other than either a piece of forensic pleading or dialogue? To make readily apparent the way in which the Apology's diairesis scandalizes both ethos and pathos as a means of persuasive speech, I want to take up a discussion of the strategy of the Apology's argument. In examining this I want to make use of ring-composition as a way of clarifying this strategy and as an instance of a specific kind of diairesis well-known in antiquity that would also have been familiar to Dionysius.

Prose Ring-Composition and the Critique of the Apology Is Argument By the first century CE ring-composition had become the most common ar-

chitectonic pattern found in ancient poetry. The commonness of this way of arranging the structure of poetry in antiquity can not be over-stressed (Woodman and West 133). Once this is conceded then it would only be natural to assume that a trajectory of prose composition, still committed to the harmony of poetic arrangement of words, would be equally committed to the primacy of a kind of natural symmetry of subject matter as a reasonable means of structuring the larger disposition of prose composition. Cairns (Generic Composition 7) and Rudd (144) identify reasonable parameters for schematizing the technique of ring-composition, parameters that apply equally well to its occurrence in prose synthesis and prose oikonomia.23 Treatments of ring composition and extended chiasmos as a specific aspect of prose economy can be found at least as far back as John Albert Bengel's Gnomon of the New Testament, first published in 1742.24 And consideration of the phenomenon as a aspect of literate compositional technique in oratory has been developed quite recently by Worthington (1991 and 1992).25

As we become increasingly aware of the degree of literate consciousness and attention to control of literate compositional technique among Attic orators and Roman writers, it becomes clear that many of these individuals were controlling the compositional design of their subject matter according to the precepts of ring composition. Dionysius challenges those in his day who would scoff at the

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general notion of sophisticated, self-conscious control of literate structure like that found in his Demosthenic ideal by pointing to Demosthenes' contemporaries, Isocrates and Plato, who, "were publishing works more like fine carving and engraving than writing" (On Arr 25, Russell's trans.; cf. On Dem. 51). From his vantage, Dionysius believed that these orators and writers had masterful control over their literate compositional practice. On one hand, Dionysius had little patience for the over-obvious parallelistic "balancing" of clauses and periods that gave the impression of synthesis being "chiseled to perfection." For example, in Attic practice he considered it merely "juvenile" (On Isoc. 12), while in contemporary Asianist practice he considered it "degenerate humbug" (On Arr. 4). On the other hand, at the level of strategic prose economy, Dionysius was utterly committed to the view that the work as a whole should exhibit a sense of natural literate balance, or afinished strategy of arrangement (On Thuc. 9, cf. Reid, "Fin- ished Technique" 432-34). Though he only addresses the latter obliquely, his own control of the diairesis of his essays demonstrates his care in this matter. The schematization of his diairesis of On the Arrangement of Words in Figure 1 offers an exceptionally clear example of this kind of control. From this perspective, ring composition of the subject matter of a speech or essay was one way to work out good diairesis in literate control of the arrangement of a discourse.

A Introduction- Importance of Prose Arrangement [Chs. 1-5]. Dionysius establishes the subject of his treatise on Arrangement and apologetically sets it in the rhetorical context of other approaches to "natural" word arrangement. He argues for the priority of dexterity in word arrangement as more important than word selection.

B Theory of the Three Tasks of the Science of Word Arrangement [Chapters 6-9]- modeled on the Theory of Prose Economy. On the threefold Science of Arrangement: 1) Seeing how to alter forms of words to effect beauty and pleasure [Ch. 7]; 2) considering how clauses may best be fitted together in overall relationship to one another; and [Ch. 8]; and 3) editorially tailoring (through addition and modification) the final form in which they are cast [Ch. 9].

C On the Ends of Arrangement: Aesthetic Pleasure [Chs. 11-12]. The Ends and Resources introduced. Discussion of how to use each of the resources of melody, rhythm, variety and appropriateness to effect Pleasure as an End.

C' On the Ends of Arrangement: Inherent Beauty [Chs. 13-20]. How to use each of the resources of melody, rhythm, variety and appropriateness to effect a sense of inherent Beauty as an End.

B' Theory of the Three Types of Composition [Chs. 21-24]- modeled on the Theory of the Three Types of Style. On the three different Types of Compositional practices: the Austere Style [Ch. 22], the Polished Style [Ch. 23], and the Well-blended Style [Ch. 24].

A' Conclusion: Importance of Prose Arrangement [Chs. 25-26] Prose that effects the power of poetry without meter is defended; an apologetic for composing according to principles of lyric arrangement defended against naysayers.

FIGURE 1: A Schematization of the Diairesis of Dionysius' Argument in On the Arrangement of Words


Obviously the theory of good diairesis in prose economy includes much more than use of prose ring-composition, but we have good reason, as I will demonstrate in what follows, to believe that some of Plato's efforts at revision, his "combing, curling and refashioning" of words, reflects a choice to structure the design of his argument with multiple layers of parallelism. It is this aspect of Plato's "written-ness"-his absolute control over the tragic plot of the Apology by way of the management of its oikonomia-that leads me to suggest that Dionysius would have viewed the diairesis of the Apology as problematic. Fig- ure 2 contains a schematization of the taxis of the speech's overarching diairesis. It does not include Socrates' "counter proposal," to the judgment of guilt ren- dered against him (35e-38b), or the "final leave-taking speech" (38c-42a) in which he accepts the penalty of death. These two addenda are separate brief speeches that are self-contained and stand slightly apart from the structure of the apologia proper. In my schematization I have included the prothesis as part of the overall proem and together, as will be indicated below, I believe the two portions represent a unity in the balance of their presentation.

Apart from the schematizations within the divisions, there are no differences from the traditional delineation of the development of the argument in this presentation because the five natural divisions of the argument are unmistakable. They are the Introduction: Prooemium (17a-18a), Statement of the Case (18a- e), First Defense (19a-24b), Defense Proper (24b-28a), Digression (28a-34b), and Peroration (34b-35d). The Proof is divided into two sections: "Against the Earlier Accusers" and "Against the Later Accusers." Even the formal use of Digression has a proper place within the older rhetorical system. Young Cicero viewed it as somewhat dated, but tells us that Hermagoras said it should follow proof and precede the peroration, functioning to add emphasis by means of amplification either through praise of oneself or abuse of the opponent (De Inv. 1.97). A Digression, as is still the case, may interrupt the flow of an argument, but is placed strategically to win the audience to the speaker's side of the debate (Quintilian, Inst. Orat. 2.4.3.12-17). In other words, my construal of the artistic development of the subject matter should not detract from the observation that this address is also a textbook-perfect speech according to sophistic compositional theory. This means that at the same time he controls the various parts of the speech, Plato presents his discourse as a model of artistic unity as well.

According to my analysis of the artistic division of the speech, the first third (the First Defense) and concluding third (the Digression) of the tripartite division of the body of the speech are both responses to his earlier accusers and their opposition to the manner in which Socrates had conducted himself.26 Both sections of argument move to a climactic center in which Socrates anticipates the criticism of his audience while explaining some surprising aspect as to how it is that he came to be known as a "wise man." In the heart of the matter (20e-21a) of the First Defense (19a-24b) he asks the dicasts "not to cry out" and make a disturbance at his revelation that it was the oracle at Delphi which was respon-

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sible for the claim that there was "none wiser" than Socrates. In the climactic center (30b-3 Ic) of the Digression (28a-34b), he again asks the dicasts "not to cry out" or make a disturbance when he reveals that were they to execute him unjustly, they would be condemning the one who had only followed "what the god orders me to do" (30b), a significant mistake for them since he was attached

I Introduction: [17a-18e]

Prooemium {17a-c} 1 Socrates claims to be no orator unless orators are those who speak truth {17c-18al 2 Socrates requests consideration for his difficult style of speaking

as that given to one who speaks with a dialect

Statement of the Case: Prothesis {18a-d) 1' Charges both old and new are untrue {18e} 2' Let the defense begin, difficult though it may be

II First Defense [19A-24B] 19a-d} A The charges of the first accusers 1{9d-20c} B Evanus lives in great wealth because of his pursuit of what he knows

{20c-d} C The request to explain what it is that Socrates busies himself with {20d-el D The origin of the reputation of Socrates {20e-21a} E The turning point in Socrates' life: the testimony of the Oracle {21b-e} D' The origin of the slander of Socrates {21e-23a} C' Socrates' account of what he does to busy himself {23a-b } B' Socrates lives in great poverty because of his pursuit

of what he does not know {23c-24b} A' The charges of the first accusers

III Defense Proper: [24b-28a] Includes a Dialectical Elenchus of Accusers {24b} A Regarding the account of Melitus' sworn deposition against Socrates {24c-26a} B Dialectical elenchus concerning the charge that he corrupts the young {26b-27e} B' Dialectical elenchus concerning the charge of impiety {27e-28a} A' Regarding the reason for Melitus' sworn deposition against Socrates

II' Digression on Socrates' Life [28a-34b] {28a} A Socrates' unpopularity with many his undoing, not Melitus and Anytus {28b-dl B A good man will not count risk of death as an arbiter of actions {28d-29a} C Examples of Socrates' unwillingness to put expediency above honor {29a-30b} D Socrates' commitment to obey the god in all his affairs {30b-31c} E Socrates attached to city by the god to prick the conscience for truth {31c-32a} D' Socrates guided in all his affairs by the god {32a-32e} C' Examples of Socrates' unwillingness to put expediency

above serving justice {32e-33b} B' Socrates would have perished as a good man if he feared the risk of death {33c-34b} A' Socrates popular with few whose testimony is not sought

by Melitus and Anytus

I' Peroration [34b-35d] {34b-d} 1 Socrates' decision not to beg for his life based on family considerations {34e} 2 First reason why: it is not proper for a man of his age and reputation {35a-b} 1' Socrates' sense of shame regarding those who beg in this fashion {35c-d} 2' Second reason why: juries should not be suborned to violate their oath

FIGURE 2: A Schematization of the Diairesis of Plato's Argument in the Apology


to the city by the god and was "a gift of the god" to the city (30e). Thus, in a balanced set of expositions, Plato's Socrates responds to the charge of impiety by, first, pressing the occasion for his own marveling at the testimony of the god of the oracle ("Whatever does the god mean? What is his riddle?" 21b) and, in the heart of the second defense, offering his own conclusion that it is not "the divine will that a better man be harmed by a worse" (30c). But the defense, in both instances, is conducted in a manner guaranteed to offend his audience and their sensibilities.

Farness, citing recent trends in interpretation of the Apology, suggests that the defense can stand as the great epitome of endless forensic examples of "how not to argue your case in court" (33). Clearly, a defense that hinges on the argument "Who am I to oppose the god in these matters?" is no self-effacing anticipatory gambit to defray criticisms of youth or inexperience. To premise the structure of the main argument of the First Defense as well as that of the Digression in a manner so patently offensive to an audience that the speaker must quell the out- cry of outrage in advance is to have structured argument in such a way as to have destroyed all hope of putting the audience in the right frame of mind. Rhetorical 'anticipation' was meant to quell any distracting reservations an audience might have at the outset in order that they might hear the substance of the argument. It was not meant as a rhetorical device to quell the audience's outrage in the midst of the argument itself (on "anticipation" as a technique to remove ill feeling see Rhet. ad Alex. 18). These two arguments implode under the weight of their own impossible task.

However, in the central portion of the speech, The Defense Proper, the discourse form shifts from presenting Socrates' case by means of a strategy of prose-poetics to his engagement of his accusers through dialectical inquiry. In this sense, we may reasonably argue that his refutation of the former opponents, the First Defense (19A-24B) actually functions as a diegesis, the traditional "narration" that should follow the prothesis and precede the pistis. In Plato's argument strategy, the "narration" and the "digression" function as a balanced set, leaving the response to the most recent opponents, the Defense Proper, to function as the "proof' proper in the climactic center of the speech. Thus, at the central hinge of the overall artistic design, the speech shifts away from oratorical proof by refutation to engage in dialectical proof through "cross-examining" his accusers (elenchus). In effect, dialectical proof is formally privileged over rhetorical proof in the inventional design of the Apology's prose economy. Logos is centrally privileged as a means of persuasion, while pathos and ethos are cleverly derailed in the surrounding argument. Attempts to justify the decision of Plato/Socrates to conduct the central proof through dialectical elenchus by indicating other such instances in Plato's approach to forensic speech miss the point (e.g., Coulter 269-303). Other such occurrences are not germane. Simi- larly, I would argue that debates as to whether or not Socrates' arguments against his later accusers represent reasonable proof (e.g., Brickhouse and Smith, Socrates

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on Trial 109) equally miss the point of what Plato has achieved. The irony of Plato's design is that the argument conducted according to the rules of the sophists in both the First Defense and the Digression, though perfect in form, are disasters in function. In Plato's hands, Socrates masterfully makes an artistic mockery of the sophistic intent behind such control of this kind of persuasion in both the First Defense and in the Digression (cf. Allen 66). The result is perfect control of rhetorical form applied with devious delight in order to achieve a total alienating of an audience's affection and the simultaneous destruction of the speaker's credibility with the audience. Though he has clearly offered a model of good form according to sophistic notions of appropriate control of arrangement and embellishment, using such strategic suasory form to destroy ethos through the arousal of emotions would be sufficient reason for Dionysius to conclude that the diairesis of this speech serves some end other than Socrates actually attempting to be vindicated by his audience. We are left with the central inquiry which is conducted by means of dialectic where the goal is not to persuade the audience, but merely to ascertain the truth of the matter.

Far from Socrates' introductory request to pay "no attention to my manner of speech," I would argue that manner of speech is the subtext throughout the Apol- ogy. Any readers who come to this discourse caught up in the sway of sophistic rhetoric, who expect a speaker to strategically arrange arguments according to principles of good diairesis, are led by the rhetoric of this text through its art, to the discovery of a proposal for a greater art: dialectic. They must go through the arguments to arrive at a level of insight in which they discover that dialectic makes the most powerful argument for truth. The form represents a strategy directed at an audience, inviting the audience-through indirection-to discover the actual truth at its center. Like the Phaedrus after it, the Apology is something of a pedagogical maze whose purpose is "to produce conviction in the soul" (Phaedrus 271 a). It has about it something of an invitation to ponder the config- ured "to do" of its argument strategies such that one must find one's way through the forensic pleading to the discovery of a better way of reasoning-of arriving at "truth"-in the central dialogue with the accusers. This is not philosophy discarding the kind of arrangement that comes by way of poetics as much as philosophy rehabilitating its forebear poetry. The innocence of logoi must come of age through the possibilities of knowledge if poetics would be conducted in a manner that permits more complex answers and more sophisticated accounts (Nussbaum 227). Thus, the argument that would later be conducted with great felicity and more overtly in the Phaedrus is conducted in the Apology as the subtext of the treatise and this almost wholly at the level ofform.

We are told at the outset of the Apology that Socrates plans to contrast his presentation of "truth" with that of those who are primarily concerned with artistically adorned speeches (kekalliepe^menous) and with carefully arranged words and phrases (rhemasi te kai onomasin oude kekosmemenous). It would, he tells us, be unfitting for a man his age to still be "toying with words" (plattonti logous)


I The Direct Proem [17a-c] A I do not know men of Athens, how my accusers affected you; CARRIED AWAY

as for me, I was almost carried away in spite of myself, BY UNTRUE so persuasively did they speak. WORDS

B And yet, hardly anything of what they said is true. Of the many lies they told, one in particular surprised me, LIES THEY TOLD: namely that you should be careful not to be deceived SOCRATES IS AN by an accomplished speaker like me. ORATOR

C That they were not ashamed to be immediately proved wrong by the facts, when I show myself not to be an accomplished speaker at all, that I thought was most shameless on their part- UNLESS ORATOR unless indeed they call an accomplished speaker IS REDEFINED the man who speaks the truth.

C' If they mean that, I would agree that I am an orator HE IS AN ORATOR B' But not after their manner, for indeed, as

I say, practically nothing they said was true. NO TRUTH IN From me you will hear the whole truth, WORDS though not, by Zeus, gentlemen, TRUTH IN HIS expressed in embroidered and stylized phrases like theirs, WORDS but things spoken at random RANDOM WORDS & and expressed in the first words that come to mind, SIMPLE WORDS for I put my trust in the justice of what I say, TRUST IN WORDS

and let none of you expect anything else. A' It would not be fitting at my age, as it might be TOYED WITH

for a young man, to toy with words when I appear before you. BY WORDS

II The Indirect Ephodos of the Proem [17c-d] A One thing I do ask and beg of you, gentlemen: WHAT HE ASKS-

if you hear me making my defense DO NOT BE in the same kind of language as I am accustomed to use SURPRISED BY in the market place by the bankers tables, MANNER OF where many of you have heard me, and elsewhere, SPEECH do not be surprised or create a disturbance on that account. B The position is this: A STRANGER TO

this is my first appearance in a lawcourt, YOUR WAY OF at the age of seventy; I am therefore SPEAKING a stranger to the manner of speaking here.

B' Just as if I were really a stranger, EXCUSING you would certainly excuse me A STRANGER FOR if I spoke in that dialect and manner HIS WAY OF in which I had been brought up, SPEAKING

A' so too my present request seems a just one, for you to pay no attention to my manner of speech- WHAT HE ASKS- be it better or worse- PAY NO but to concentrate your attention ATTENTION TO on whether what I say is just or not, HIS MANNER OF for the excellence of a judge lies in this, SPEECH as that of a speaker lies in telling the truth.

FIGURE 3 A Schematization of the Taxis of the Argument in the Proem of the Apology (Grube's Translation)

(17B-C). Though it was a customary prooemium gambit to demur concerning one' s speaking skill, Plato's Socrates transcends this topos by claiming that for his part he will eschew all such efforts in favor of "random" and "chance words" (eike^ legomena tois epituchousin onomasin). Furthermore, these "chance words" would be offered by a man who seeks and speaks only the truth; "And let none

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of you expect anything else." Of course, anyone who believes that Plato's Socrates ever speaks "chance words" has yet to learn how to read the philosopher. The fact that there is never a chance word is the quality that makes Plato's Apology such marvelous reading and gives rise, therefore, to doubts as to its possible historical accuracy. The irony of such statements is even more explicit when their actual taxis is viewed in the schematized representation in Figure 3.

As can be observed, word arrangement in the direct proem is as far removed from chance as its diction is from marketplace talk. Clearly Plato "toyed with words" in just the way Dionysius tells us he was famous for doing ("Every scholar knows the anecdotes of his industry, especially the story of the tablet found after his death containing the opening sentence of the Republic, with the words arranged in various ways;" On Arr 25, Russell's trans.) The Apology's proem is an excellent example of the high art of positioning periods with relationship to one another, while neatly orchestrating the clauses of balanced subject matter with symmetry and antithesis (Allen 63). What are we to make of the contradic- tion between form and content here? Does his speech become the very lie he protests by toying with his words in precisely this manner? Or is he just "toying" with everyone? To our modern ears, this is high irony at its wicked best. To Attic ears, however, it was merely wicked. This is style ironically belying the substance of its subject matter. As irony, it would have been received with re- proach because eirdn and all its related words, at this period, implied an inten- tion to deceive that is alien to our modern conception of irony (Arist. Rhet. 2.2.24). As a posture, irony does not lose the implication of disingenuousness and assume something of our more modern notion of sardonic playfulness with con- traries or even the knowing put-down, until the first centuries BCE and CE. Vlastos reminds us that it is a later generation's reflection on the wryness of Socratic style that probably led to the "upward mobility" of the term (Ironist 28- 29).27 In the modern sense we might say that offering a model piece of oratory at both the logical and the artistic level would be a double irony, but the ancients would have merely experienced it as a doubly disingenuous mockery of the audience and the seriousness of the situation (Allen 63).

What we are left with is a text that begins by warning its readers not to look for its argument in the manner of sophistic expectations-a perfectly fine attempt to dispel prejudice by an individual known for his sophisticated control of words. But the audience reading these words (assuming Dionysius' negative judgment is correct) was experienced in understanding sophistic expectations in artistic arrangement and would immediately recognize such words as an exemplar of rhetorical modesty. With "manner of speech" versus "truth" posed as the point of entry into the question at issue, readers would be properly disposed to encounter a speech in which artistic arrangement of words is at issue.28 As the schematization of Figure 3 indicates, they are immediately confronted with the argument implicit in the form belying the argument of the content. Given the rhetorically self-effacing posture recommended as an opening gambit for the


proem, readers would reasonably come to the argument proper with an expectation that it would be composed with similar attention to balance in its manner of speech and they are not disappointed; at least not until the discovery is made that the structure of balance leads them, so to speak, down a garden path. With the collapse of "artistic reason," the reader is left with no recourse but to place hope in the evidence of the dialectical inquiry. Those hopes are rewarded with Plato establishing that Meletus' charge against Socrates is filled with contradictions and, therefore, not believable. Dialectic succeeds where even the best sophistic defense fails, ostensibly because the goal all along should have been to arrive at truth rather than the possibility of being "carried away" because "so persuasively did they speak."

Critiquing Dionysius' Critique Because the audiences for such texts in antiquity were born of generations for

whom reasoning strategies rooted in form were yet to be subsumed by more linear reasoning strategies rooted in literate logics (Ong 87), they would have been alive (in ways difficult for us to experience) to the pedagogical argument implicit in the design of this text whose strategy of reasoning is still located in orality even as it is giving birth to the new literate logic that would eventually come on its heels. Plato writes for an oral culture, but composes in a textually self-absorbed manner in which play with previous form becomes so obsessive that, were he to permit it, form would subvert content (cf. Reid, 'Compositional Style" 60). And, of course, this is his point. In this sense, as Cornelia Coulter has already observed, Plato's Apology meets all the artistic criteria of a plot in Greek tragedy,

The action has moved from the opening words of Socrates to the close with the "inexorable inevitability" which writers on drama demand of tragedy. The catastrophe is brought about, as Aristotle said it should be, by a quality of Socrates himself-his unwillingness to make a single concession to popular opinion. And the character of Socrates, as Plato has drawn it, surely follows the precept laid down by Aristotle that a tragic poet should make his characters 'true to life and yet more beautiful' [Poetics 15]. (142)

More recently, McKim has argued for interpreting all Platonic dialogues as drama and suggests that it is the dominance of assumptions among Anglo-Ameri- can analytic philosophers about the task of philosophizing, itself, that leads in- terpreters to read Socratic arguments as if they are Plato's own arguments. He reminds us that the choice to read the dialogues in this way collapses the critical distance we would otherwise grant between an author and the author's characters (34-35). How well does Plato manage the plot of the Apology? Clearly the response one offers depends on what you think Plato is about in the work and your ability to appreciate eiron as a means of achieving insight.29

Would Dionysius have recognized the argument implicit in the form of Plato's prose economy? Given the elegance of his own chiastic design in the prose

REID/APOLOGY 81

economy of his essays we can assume that he was attuned to such matters. The question we would have, given the diaresis of the work as argued here, is whether Dionysius would have grasped the ironic manner in which the work privileges dialectic in inquiry. If he did, we can also assume, given his credentials as an avowed classicist whose announced project was to recover Attic theories of arrangement, that he was less than appreciative of an argument disparaging the importance of arrangement as a means to effect persuasion. In fact, if my reading of the argument implicit in the arrangement of the Apology is reasonable, we would expect nothing short of utter contempt from the critic who became the high priest of the "religion" of arrangement theory. And it is contempt that we hear in his summary analysis and dismissal.

Conclusion Can I say with confidence that Dionysius considered the Apology to be an

example of the kind of exercise that he knew as controversiae? No. In the end, we may need to grant to Dionysius's critically phrased circumlocution the same ambiguity that we acknowledge readily today: it is often difficult to tell where Plato's dramatic license ends and the Socratic reality begins. But to grant this to Dionysius is to confess that he was aware that the Apology takes dramatic license and that, in this instance, its genre may have more to do with license than fact. At a minimum we should grant Dionysius the critical skill necessary to distinguish a work of what we would call dramatic literature from actual oratory-even after-the-fact literately polished oratory. What we know is that Dionysius offered this aside concerning the Apology to an audience wholly familiar with taking such dramatic license in composing discourse. Seneca in- forms his first century CE audience that he composed his controversiae and suasoria in an effort to recall what the great Augustan declaimers ("those who came before your time" [Cont. 4]) had once said. Dramatic license, which is the essence of this kind of art, was the essence of Augustan rhetoric. It was a venue of discourse with which Dionysius would have been very familiar but nowhere commends. Gabba has recently made a convincing case that Dionysius' principle of imitatio was not one which privileges declamation as an end, but rather, attempted to identify precisely that excellence of idealistic and moral content in Attic discourse that would serve the Augustan empire in the ascendancy of its political rule. Critics who promoted imitatio of the classic models of Greek oratory sought to identify the excellence of idealistic and moral content through stylistic and literary analysis that extolled the potential of the empire (33). Dionysius urges imitatio of Attic models of discourse because he interprets clas- sicism "as the best example afforded to the Greek upper classes for the preserva- tion of unity and identity" (Gabba, 34; cf. On Anc. Orat. 4). Thus, if he did think of the Apology as some form of Augustan declamatory rhetoric, he would have viewed it as unworthy to compare with the "incomparable" political rhetoric of Demosthenes. Such a comparison would have diminished the ideological dimension of his entire scholarly project to promote the Demosthenic ideal as the model of discursive practice in Augustan Rome and the Imperial empire.


Apart from issues of genre, what has become apparent in this inquiry is that Dionysius' critical methodology does bring clarity to how he would have been able to form an opinion about the genre-why he was able to dismiss the work as "neither oratory nor dialogue." The theory of prose economy as expressed in Dionysius of Halicarnassus represents an important aspect of ancient rhetorical theory that has been overshadowed in the privileging of the existing handbook and Aristotelian tradition. Similarly, my chiastic reading of the Apology as an instance of prose diairesis situates this phenomenon of prose composition as an aspect of theory that originates in narrative poetics but is equally viewed as an aspect of arrangement in oratory as well.

Assumptions about form are at the heart of this inquiry, and it is here that we may say the more significant gains may be noted. I have arrayed the speech chiastically to demonstrate that the issue of "manner of speech vs. dialectic" is the subject of the Apology at the level of form and that the argument conducted in the form is quite different than the argument offered as the content of Socrates' actual defense of his life. Fowler has recently argued that he is suspicious of the current critical zeal for chiasm, in part, because of the silence of the rhetorical handbook tradition concerning it and, also, because he finds its visually literate complexity too much to expect of the original oral-aural audiences. However, as he ponders the inductive evidence of the parallels in studies like that of Dewey's analysis of a portion of the Gospel of Mark, he is led to aver that he wants to keep an open mind about the subject. More to the point I want to make here, Fowler concludes this observation with the following challenge: "If chiasm ... is yet another narrative strategy of duality, then we may want to inquire as to the pragmatic and rhetorical functions of such repetitive arrangements at the level of discourse and not just at the level of story. Modern critics have tended to define chiasm more in terms of story content and less in terms of narrative strategy or discourse. If attention can be shifted from neat diagrams and architec- tural symmetry visually apprehended, to the progressive, temporal encounter that every hearer and reader of [Mark's] Gospel experiences, then we may better understand not what chiastic structures are visually but how they function tem- porally" (152). This study is a response to this justifiable kind of critique.

My interest in considering chiasm as an aspect of prose diairesis in this study has been to indicate the nature of the author's strategy of discourse rather than a mere demonstration of the Apology's symmetry. I have argued here, and elsewhere ("Finished Technique") that ancient authors were able to play with audience expectations concerning the assumption of good form in the prose economy of their arrangement and were able to conduct argument in form apart from the temporal one-thing-after-another of the actual dramatic plot of their story. In the Apology, to the degree that we can hear the voice of Plato, I would argue that it may be found more clearly in the argument strategy of the rhetorical form (in what Dionysius would come to call its diairesis) than the content of the argument Plato places on Socrates' lips. The result is that we have a possible instance of what Dionysius treats as an otherwise clear notion of good prose economy-good that is if you have developed a taste for Platonic irony. Dionysius may want to argue with us over the adjective "good," but it is his critical sensi-

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bility that in a back-handed manner provides the means by which we can justi- fiably identify a trajectory of tradition in the theory of prose economy through which we can most clearly identify and hear Plato's voice.

If my reading of the Apology's strategy of argument is correct, it would seem that it is Socratic ways of knowing truth that were on trial in the Apology rather than Socrates himself. The latter merely becomes the literary vehicle of discovering the former through a marvelous game of indirection. On one hand this analysis may still seem to fall short of an answer to the question that brings many critics to Dionysius' assertion concerning the Apology. On the other hand, I would argue that the question whether or not the Apology is "fiction" (e.g., Brickhouse and Smith vs. Friedlander) is wrong-headed. It is much the same as the contemporary Jesus Seminar still trying to determine which sayings of Jesus are "fictions" of the church and which sayings are "true." Disclaimers aside, it is a kind of historicism in which we transpose questions back onto the ancient texts and ask of them a response to questions not posed by them. Plato's Socrates would remind us that this is why he is suspicious of writing in the first place; it simply is not very amenable to questions.

In light of this we do well to be reminded by Gadamer that we must always beware of asking Plato's dialogues to answer questions Plato is not posing: "I must continue to insist that in Plato the discussion is about dialectic, whether in the Phaedo, Republic, Phaedrus, Sophist, Parmenides, or the Seventh Letter. It has always to do with resisting the sophistic tricks of obfuscation in the use of arguments, and to hold fast to the idea of what is really meant by dialogue" (266). Although I doubt that Gadamer meant this list of Platonic works to be exhaustive, in light of the argument offered here, I would add the Apology to it. Far from suggesting that such an inclusion would place Plato in a difficult position of answering questions he is not asking, I would propose that the text is directed precisely at readers whose assumptions about form would provide them with the principles and possibilities of discovering that "dialectic," perhaps more than being the subtext, is the substantive issue on trial in the Apology. If so, we can make sense of it because of Dionysius' intriguing critical assessment and his careful delineation of existing rhetorical theory concerning what makes for good diairesis in the theory of prose economy. The implications of the latter should give pause as we wonder what other aspects of rhetorical practice in antiquity might yield new insights when considered in terms of the theory of prose economy.

St. Martin's College

Notes 1

For ease of access, all citations unless otherwise indicated are from the Loeb editions. Dionysius' Critical Essays are collected in two volumes translated by Stephen Usher (1974, 1985). However, following Russell, I refer to Dionysius' essay Peri Sunthesebs Onomaton as On the Arrangement of Words (On Arr.) rather than On Literary Composition.


2 Brickhouse and Smith advocate the essential veracity view for the Apology (10) and offer the following list of critics who share their view: Allen, Burnet, Cornford, Ehrenberg, Ferguson, *Galli, Gomez Robledo, Grote, Guthrie, *Horneffer, *Humbert, Kraut, Nussbaum, Osborn, *Rudberg, Vlastos, Vogel, and *Zeller; 3n8-9. Asterisks in the former indicate works cited in French or German. In support of the "fiction theory" Brickhouse and Smith cite Adorno, Ast, Bonnard, Bruns, *Chroust, Derenne, Dupredl, Friedlinder, Gigon, Gomperz, Kuhn, Lesky, Montuori, *Murray, Norvin, *Oldfather, Raschini, Schanz, and *Shorey. Asterisks in this list indicate untranslated works in English. Readers un- doubtedly could provide additional names of Anglo-American critics who support the notion that the Socrates of the Apology is primarily a literary creation; e.g., Sandbach concludes in the essay on Plato in the Cambridge History of Classical Literature, "But to many readers it seems more likely that it was Plato who made [Socrates] talk thus, to create an image of the man and his relation to Athenian society" (73). But that Brickhouse and Smith would even devise such a list clearly challenges Friedlander's sweeping assertion, first made in the 1950's, that, "Nobody, to be sure, would claim today that Plato's Apology reproduces, in its essentials, the actual speech delivered by Socrates" (157). Brickhouse and Smith take a more "agnostic" position in their recent collaboration (Plato's Socrates viii). 3According to Quintilian, fictive declamation on deliberative and forensic themes became a literate classroom exercise about 300 BCE (2.4.41), but one need not assume that the genre was born in the classroom. 4For other efforts to create Socratic apologia see Lesky, 499. 5 Though Vlastos states that he speaks of reliable recreation of the thought and character of Socrates rather than reportage of what was said, his clarification that the speech had sufficient fidelity to the original person that no one would have felt the need to ask such questions clearly indicates that he views the differences as one of degree not kind (genre). 6 Thompson reports that the existing portions of the History of Archaic Rome contain fifteen such extended addresses, each with at least six pages of text averaging 320 words per page; 305. 7Momigliano finds that with the Socratics biography came to occupy an ambiguous position between fact and imagination, between truth and fiction, as Plato and Xenophon experimented in the genre, attempting to capture "potentialities rather than the realities of individual lives." He suggests that their depiction of Socrates, like the Jesus of the Gospel writers, is presented as a living guide whose prior discourse and words are appro- priated and re-explored in new applications and re-addressed to current questions (46). If Momigliano is correct in locating the Apology in the shadowlands of biography, then Lesky's pronouncement that the Apology functions as "an outspoken piece of propaganda for the life of a philosopher" (520) may be our nearest contemporary echo of the Dionysian sensibility. 8Loraux notes that critics in the modem centuries have often either failed to grasp that "the philosopher wanted to dissipate the mirage of the funeral oration by turning the speech against itself' or have committed the opposite error and have taken the work too seriously (9-10). However one views the Menexenus, Dionysius' choice of it is problematic at best. That he finds numerous examples of "inaccurate and unrefined" expressions, 'juvenile and frigid" expressions, language lacking in "force and vigor," "grace and charm'" and language that is occasionally "bombastic and vulgar" (On Dem. 29), suggests that Dionysius may be equally guilty of the latter of the errors in interpretation that Loraux indicates. If the oration is a parody of funeral orations, one is hard pressed to separate Plato the stylist, who can out-speak his contemporaries at their own game, and Plato the parodist, who can commit the very errors Dionysius points out in order to mock what passes for funeral oration stylistics. 9 E.g., we could look to Greek protreptic in the scholia as yet another alternative if the

REID/APOLOGY 85

purpose here was to continue speculation. 10 As an exemplar of "truly good" estate management Xenophon has Socrates relate four conversations Ischomachus had with his wife. The first conversation arrives at a balanced division of labor between the husband and wife (7); the second arrives at an appropriate ordering of objects in an estate (8); the third arrives at the actual implementation of the division and order in everyday life (e.g., "When we had divided all the movable property into separate categories, we distributed each and every item to its appropriate place. Then we showed the servants, since they are the ones to use them, the proper place for all the utensils they use on a daily basis . . .") (9); the fourth dialogue argues for natural rather than artificial adornment.

The topic turns up quite regularly in the works of Xenophon (e.g., Memoirs 1.2.64, 1.5.3, 2.1.19, 3.4.7-12, 4.1.2 and 4.5.10) and Aristotle devotes most of Book I of the Politics (1253b-1260b) to a threefold division of proper estate management (rule over slaves, rule of a father, and rule of a husband). We also have other works in the genre of oeconomica from pseudo-Aristotle and Philodemus and Waterfield argues that the true fount of the genre is Hesiod's Works and Days, and quite probably the now lost Great Works and Precepts of Chiron (276-77). 12 Although Isocrates does not use the term oikonomia to describe his conception of composition in To the Children of Jason, the analogy of the "truly good life" he employs to establish this principle is grounded in what both Xenophon and Aristotle treat as the art of estate management. It is worth noting that Isocrates technical use of exergasia is carried forward as one of the three tasks of good prose oikonomia by the first century BCE. For a further exploration of the theory of prose economy as a development of the theory implicit in this Isocratean text see Reid, "Theory of Prose Oikonomia." 13 Awareness of the distinctions Quintilian describes and Dionysius applies can be found at the outset of his treatise On the Sublime where the author states that "Inventive skill [t&s eureseos] and the proper order [taxin] and disposition [oikonomian] of material are not manifested in a good touch here or there, but reveal themselves in slow degrees as they run through the whole texture of the composition" (1.4; Dorsch trans.). Similar distinctions which place taxis and oikonomia at least on an equal footing can be found in the Ad Herennium (3.8.16), in Sulpitus Victor (14) and as late as Athanasius (Rabe, Proleg. Syll, 176). The former is generally termed Natural Arrangement (ordo naturalis for taxis) while the later is said to represent principles of Artistic Arrangement (ordo artificiosus for oikonomia) (Caplan, 1954, 184-85). 14 On oikonomia as a rhetorical term see Matthes, 111-114. The narrowing of the concept of oikonomia as an unusual approach to arrangement is found only in the late sources (Meijering 142). 15 Further development of the Dionysian theory of prose economy can be found in Reid, "Theory of Prose Oikonomia." 16 Surviving fragments in Usener-Radermacher VI, 197-217. For ease of access I will cite the material from Gn. Pomp. 3-6. 17 As a form of narrative, historia is a subset of poetics; cf. Arist. Poetics 145 1a35-b6 and 1459al7-29. 1 When Dionysius comes to discuss Thucydides' taxis in On Thucydides he is over- whelmed with what he sees as the glaring problem of sequence as it relates to the entire diairesis of the work. Individual issues of positioning sequence pale in the face of the larger issue. He begins his treatment of Thucydides' order with the following observation, "Some critics also find fault with the order [ten taxin] of [Thucydides'] history, complaining that he neither chose the right beginning for it nor a fitting place to end it. They say that by no means the least important aspect of good arrangement [oikonomias] is that a work should begin where nothing can be imagined as preceding, and end where nothing further is felt to be required" (10). Dionysius views this as a fatal flaw. If the


distribution of the diairesis is ill-conceived, then it is unlikely that the discourse will have an appropriate internal order of its parts. Thus, he expresses frustration with the rhetorical order in which Thucydides reveals the arguments for the cause of the Peloponnesian war in Chapter 11, "But he ought to have stated at the beginning of his enquiry into the true causes of the war the cause which he considered to be the true one: for not only was it a natural requirement that prior events should have precedence over later ones, and true causes be stated before false ones, but the start of his own narrative would have been more powerful if he had adopted this arrangement [oikonomia]." In Chapter 12, he makes a similar charge that by ending his narrative with the battle of Cynossema, five years before the war actually came to a close, Thucydides demonstrated that "his own narrative is not organized [6ikonomesthai] in the best possible way" (12). Hence, for Dionysius, conscious management of the artistic unity of the pre-selected arguments of a narrative can only occur if the diairesis frames the topic in an appropriate manner. 19 In the fourth of his four extant essays on Attic orators, On Demosthenes, Dionysius divides the essay into two aspects of style (selection of words and arrangement of words), indicating that he planned to discuss Demosthenes' handling of subject matter in a separate essay (58). 20 "The science of arrangement [t&s sunthetikes epistem&s] has three functions: (i) to see what combinations produce a total character which is beautiful and agreeable; (ii) to know what configuration of each of the elements to be combined will improve the joint effect; (iii) to recognize and execute in appropriate fashion [oikeios exergasthai] any necessary modification of the original elements- subtraction, addition, or alteration" (On Arr 6, Russell's trans.). 21 In the introduction of his theoretical essay On the Arrangement of Words, Dionysius states, "Although, in proper order at least, the arrangement of words falls into second place when the subject of style is under consideration, since the selection of words natu- rally takes precedence and is assumed to have been made, yet for the achievement of pleasing, persuasive, and powerful effects in discourse [kratos en tois logois] it is far more potent [ouk olig6 kreitton ekeines echei] than the other. And no one should think it strange that, whereas the choice of words has been the subject of many serious investiga- tions, which have caused much discussion among philosophers and men of state, composition, though it holds second place in order, and has been the subject of far less discussion than the other, yet possesses so much importance and potency [dunamin] that it surpasses and outweighs the other's achievements. It must be remembered that . . . the potentialities of composition are second in logical order to those of selection, but prior in potency [te de dunamei]" (2). This is much the same argument as that in On Dem. 51, where the issue of oikonomia's "potency" vs. that of heuresis is also raised. 22 For the nuance of translating key rhetorical terms see the "Index Dionysiacus" in Cronje (174-280) and in Roberts (285-334). This threefold formulation of the "means of persuasion" as pathos, ethos, and agonistic force does not represent a repudiation of logos. As a means of persuasion, logos is not in view in an essay devoted to aspects of the Demosthenic control of style. But what Dionysius does achieve in this closing statement concerning his advocacy of the Demosthenic ideal is to present a cumulative argument to the effect that the stylistic aspects of agonistic force involved in both diction and composition should be viewed as on par with ethos and pathos in effecting persuasion and, therefore, should constitute a fourth means of persuasion (pistis). 23 For additional clarification see Cairns' chapter on "Inversion" in Generic Composition 127-37. 24 For example, in the introductory comments directing readers to his Index of rhetorical terms used extensively in his analysis he states, "Especial advantage, however, is ob- tained from consideration of the oratio concisa, or semiduplex derived from the Hebrew style, and the Chiasmos, which is of the greatest service in explaining the economy of the

RiD/APOLOGY 87

whole epistle to the Hebrews;" Bengel 1:64. Modem reference to this kind of subject matter parallelism in biblical studies can be found in Talbert, Dewey, Tolbert, and numerous other studies), but it was Bengel who first located architectonic parallelism as an aspect of the prose economy of a whole treatise. 25 A caveat on ring composition as a prose technique of controlling subject matter. Since the mid fifties there has been a rather polarized debate as to whether or not writers and orators made use of this compositional technique in ordering the strategy of their reasoning. The short version of the debate has to do with prior commitments to the orality of much of this literature. If a critic believes that it was primarily conceived as a mnemonic device in orality, then that critic might balk at the level of literate control necessary to predicate extensive subject matter parallelism in a treatise. If, with an increasing number of rhetorical scholars, a critic believes that the fourth century brought a revolution in literate consciousness, he or she would be less troubled by the notion that authors like Isocrates and Plato would fuss over the compositional symmetry of their works. On the orality vs. literacy issue I simply cite orality theorist Albert Lord's recent support of the notion of ring and chiastic composition. In a summary comment on the ring structure of a piece of discourse, Lord states, "Suffice it to say at the moment that each scene can be analyzed in this way, as well as the whole narrative, in terms of rings or chiastic construc- tions, resembling Cedric Whitman's analysis of Homer's Iliad. Some would doubt that the oral-traditional poets would have the ability to construct scenes, and perhaps even an entire poem of some length, in this manner. Here is proof that they not only can do but actually do just that." For Lord, "Our poetics [and much of our rhetoric] is derived from the world of orality, with some later additions and modifications introduced by the world of literacy" (32). Thus, parallelism as a mnemonic device in orality becomes a carefully controlled inventional device of argument and cause and effect in literate composition. It is reasonable to assume that the mnemonic symmetry of oral theories of arranging a work would overlap the literate, more linear categories that were also emerging; cf. Lentz, 132-33. 26 On the tripartite division of the body of the speech as distinct from the normal rhetorical divisions of the argument see Reeve (3-4). 27 Aristotle does recognize irony as a means of jest, superior to that of buffoonery (Rhet. 3.18.7). As a communicative style it was considered disingenuous, conveying a "mock- ing sarcasm," a style of discourse for which Socrates was considered the paradigmatic example (Vlastos, Ironist 21-44; cf. Gorg. 489e). Thrasymachus, by Plato's account, considered "habitual shamming" the hallmark of the Socratean style (Rep. 337a). For his part, Cicero (On Orat. 2.67) considered Socrates to be elegant in his ironic dissimulation, while Quintilian found the notion of dissimulation already quaint; Inst. Or 9.2.44-53. 28 Worthington has recently proposed (Commentary) that ring-composition controls the strategy of prose composition in Dinarchus' speech Against Demosthenes. Without ne- gating the standard divisions of the introduction, statement of the case, proof, and conclusion, Worthington demonstrates that the extended symmetrical inversions of subject matter control the structure and progression of reasoning within these traditional divisions. Whether this is a product of the speech as originally delivered or a factor of extensive after-the-fact literate revision is moot for my present purposes. The textual evidence of the written speech establishes that Dinarchus assumed that ring composition was the ideal "manner of speech" by which to control his literate prose economy. For an example of the same kind of control exercised in the prose economy of Isocrates' Evagoras see Reid, "Finished Technique" 431. The fact that speakers were imitating the literate compositional techniques of writers simply underscores the pervasiveness and persuasive- ness of this manner of sophistic compositional practice. On Sophists as those formulating literate theory in the composition of speeches see Alcidamas' "Concerning Those Who Write Written Speeches, or Concerning Sophists." 291 pose the question because, in general, Plato's dialogues exist in a netherworld some-


where between a treatise and tragedy called dialectic. How well one "manages" (oikonomei) plots is discussed by Aristotle in the Poetics at 13.10 (1453a) and elaborated in Chapter 17 (1455a-b) where Aristotle describes the process in a manner consistent with an incipient version of what eventually became the theory of prose economy. At Poetics 17 he states, "In constructing plots [tous muthous sunistanai] and completing the effect [te^ lexei sunapergazesthai] by the help of dialogue, the poet should, as far as possible, keep the scene before his eyes. Only thus by getting the picture as clear as if he were present at the actual event, will he find what is fitting [to prepon] and detect contradictions [e'kista an lanthanoi to ta hupeantia]" (1455a). It would be anachronistic to attribute a developed theory of economic prose composition to Aristotle, but much as with the later development of the Virtues of Style system in Theophrastus, the seeds of what was pedagogically turned into a "system" lie incipiently in this essay. The important matter for the theory of prose economy is that, in Aristotle, its impetus is found in the Poetics rather than the Rhetoric.

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