back to English 705 syllabus

English 705: Book Reports
(Suggestions)

Unit I: The Renaissance

Seigel, Rhetoric and Philosophy in Renaissance Humanism: The Union
   of Eloquence and Wisdom
Clark, John Milton at St. Paul's School: A Study of Ancient Rhetoric
   in English Renaissance Education
Ong, Ramus, Method, and the Decay of Dialogue: From the Art of
   Discourse to the Art of Reason
Eisenstein, The Printing Revolution in Early Modern Europe

Unit II: The Enlightenment

Toulmin, Cosmopolis: The Hidden Agenda of Modernity
Kimball, Orators & Philosophers: A History of the Idea of Liberal Education
Warner, Letters of the Republic: Publication and the Public Sphere in
   Eighteenth Century America
Calhoun, Habermas and the Public Sphere
Miller, The Formation of College English: Rhetoric and Belles Lettres
   in the British Cultural Provinces
Crowley, The Methodical Memory: Invention in Current Traditional
   Rhetoric

Unit III: High Modernism

Cmiel, Democratic Eloquence: The Fight over Popular Speech in
   Nineteenth Century America
Connors, Composition-Rhetoric: Backgrounds, Theory, and Pedagogy
Menand, The Metaphysical Club
Bledstein, The Culture of Professionalism: The Middle Class and the
   Development of Higher Education in America
Bakhtin, Speech Genres and Other Late Essays
Weaver, Ethics of Rhetoric
Black, Rhetorical Criticism: A Study in Method
Booth, Modern Dogma and the Rhetoric of Assent