Chapter 12

 Chapter 12 is all about oral discourse and the delivery of a written rhetoric as well as the history of one. The author gives a brief introduction about how oral delivery was a common method in the days of Aristotle due to the fact that most people were unable to write. This led to the oral delivery being crucial in an argument. The problem with this was that whoever was reading the rhetoric could completely alter the piece just by adjusting the delivery which angered many rhetors such as Aristotle because it detracted from their work.

Ethos is a valuable part of oral delivery because everything you do physically affects the ethos. If you raise your voice you could be considered angry or excited whereas if you avoid eye contact the audience might find you distrustful. Hand gestures are another important piece, a lot of people say they talk with their hands and this is no exaggeration. The types of movements you make and the speed can tell the audience what your tone is and how they should be responding to your delivery. One of the ways that rhetors were able to preserve their voice in writing was in the creation of punctuation which was non-existent in early years. By putting a period or exclamation mark in the writing the rhetor could dictate how the piece was read keeping the delivery how it was intended by the writer.

Another important piece of literary rhetoric is the imagery in the writing. By using certain words that are descriptive and vivid you can put the reader in the shoes of the writer and make it feel like they are almost there. This type of relation can be extremely useful because of the strong ethos effect it has on the audience in helping them relate.