Sherwin Cody

The Art of Writing & Speaking English Sherwin Cody

The first textbook on rhetoric which still remains to us was written by Aristotle. He defines rhetoric as the art of writing effectively, viewing it primarily as the art of persuasion in public speaking, but making it include all the devices for convincing or moving the mind of the hearer or reader.

Aristotle's treatise is profound and scholarly, and every textbook of rhetoric since written is little more than a restatement of some part of his comprehensive work. It is a scientific analysis of the subject, prepared for critics and men of a highly cultured and investigating turn of mind, and was not originally intended to instruct ordinary persons in the management of words and sentences for practical purposes.

While no one doubts that an ordinary command of words may be learned, there is an almost universal impression in the public mind, and has been even from the time of Aristotle himself, that writing well or ill is almost purely a matter of talent, genius, or, let us say, instinct. It has been truly observed that the formal study of rhetoric never has made a single successful writer, and a great many writers have succeeded preeminently without ever having opened a rhetorical textbook. It has not been difficult, therefore, to come to the conclusion that writing well or ill comes by nature alone, and that all we can do is to pray for luck