Farnsworth's Classical English Rhetoric

“I must refrain from shouting what a brilliant work this is (præteritio). Farnsworth has written the book as he ought to have written it – and as only he could have written it (symploce). Buy it and read it – buy it and read it (epimone).”—Bryan A. Garner, Garner's Modern English Usage

Everyone speaks and writes in patterns. Farnsworth is your guide to patterns known as rhetorical figures that can make your words more emphatic, memorable, and effective.

This book details the timeless principles of rhetoric from Ancient Greece to the present day, drawing on examples in the English language of consummate masters of prose, such as Lincoln, Churchill, Dickens, Melville, and Burke.

Most rhetorical figures amount to departures from simple and literal statement, such as repeating words, putting words into an unexpected order, leaving out words that might have been expected, asking questions and then answering them. All apply to the composition of a simple sentence or paragraph—repetition and variety, suspense and relief, concealment and surprise, the creation of expectations and then the satisfaction or frustration of them.

Farnsworth's Classical English Rhetoric is for anyone who wants to be a better speaker or writer.