Too little do we today possess sufficient learning and practice in the art of rhetoric. Habituated as we are, instead, to speech constituted primarily of unthinking repetition of oft-stated phrases, true eloquence in any style has become unfamiliar. Retrieving the art of rhetoric—the ability to persuade—requires not only a re-discovery and re-habituation to the tools of language, however. It requires also a holistic and well-integrated education.
The Institutio Oratoria of Quintilian
In his magisterial Institutio Oratoria, or Institutes of Oratory, Marcus Fabius Quintilianus (or simply Quintilian) provides us the guide to such an education. Here, he details all the foundations necessary for learning the orator’s art. Though many observations are situated to the time and place in which he wrote (this work being completed ~c.95AD), Quintilian’s text proves full of perennial insights. We have much to learn from him.
Accordingly, the Lyceum Institute is delighted to announce a publication of H.E. Butler’s English translation of the Institutio Oratoria. As with all our republications, we have priced it affordably: $22. The text is not perfect, but for a working copy of this great and until-now difficult to acquire text (in any decently-formatted, decently-priced edition), this is a great bargain.
We have also made the text freely available in PDF here. Please consider donating if you download our work!
Quintilian was an educator and rhetorician born in 35 AD, whose sole surviving major work—this Institutio Oratoria—has endured with great influence over the millennia. Spanning twelve books, Quintilian takes up nearly every topic of rhetoric; from the manner of a youth’s education towards the development of eloquence, to the role of imitation and the history of great orators, to the parts of an oration, the knowledge necessary, and the best way to argue different kinds of legal cases.
This English-edition reprint includes all twelve books and is priced to make Quintilian more accessible for a wider audience. Amazon.
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