Alex Mueller University of Massachusetts Boston alex.mueller@umb

1. Rhetorical Intimacy: Geoffrey Chaucer, Poetry, and the ArsDictaminis Alex Mueller University of Massachusetts Boston alex.mueller@umb.edu

2. ArsDictaminis: Death of the Personal Letter? “Dictamen’styranny of stylistic prescriptions . . . discouraged the spontaneity and direct expression of thought and feeling that, at other times in history, have given the personal letter its distinctive character. With the diffusion of the prescription of arsdictaminis the personal letter as such disappeared.” Ronald G. Witt, The Two Latin Cultures and the Foundation of Renaissance Humanism in Medieval Italy, 264.

3. Erasmus on Ovid’s Heroides “. . . the common good must take precedence over private grief . . .” Opus de conscribendisepistolis (1522)

4. The “Poet-Like” Manner of the Ovidian Women I had gretwondir of thairlayis sere Quhilkis in that arte mycht have na way compere Of castisquent, rethorikcolourisfyne So poete-lyk in subtyle fair manere And elaquentfyrmecadensregulere. (817-21) Gavin Douglas, The Palis of Honoure (1501)

5. Chaucer:A Woman’s Friend “ . . . he was evir. . . all womanisfrend” Gavin Douglas, Eneados (1513)

6. Cicero’s Letters to his Friends Epistolae ad familiares Marcus Tullius Cicero (Venice: Johannes da Spira, 1469)

7. The Deceptive Rhetoric of “Frendshippe” Therefore be no wyght so nyce, To take a love oonly for chere, Or speche, or for frendlymanere, For this shal every woman fynde, That som man, of his pure kynde, Wolshewen outward the fayreste, Tyl he have caught that what him leste. (1.276-82) Geoffrey Chaucer, TheHouse of Fame

8. Dido’s Friendly Rhetoric She seyde, certes, that she sory was That he hath had swychperyl and swichcas; And, in hire frendlyspeche, in this manere She to hymspak, and seyde as ye may here. (1082-5) Chaucer, The Legend of Good Women

9. Giovanni di BonandreaBrevisintroductioad dictamen View from my apartment. Bibilioteca di Bologna MS 313, f. 2r Early 14th century

10. A New Rhetorical Category:Habitus De adiectionepersonarumhabituprecellentium [On the salutation of persons distinguished by habitus] . . . Et item corporisaliquamcommoditatem non naturadatamsed studio et industriacomparatam . . . [And again [we name that habitus], some proportion of the body not given by nature but collected by study and industry.] Giovanni di Bonandrea, Brevisintroductio ad dictamen Biblioteca di Bologna, MS 2461, 77r

11. Dido’s Dead Letter Upon the fir of sacryfice she sterte, And with his swerd she rofhyre to the herte. But as mynauctourseith, yit thus she seyde; Or she was hurt, byforen or she deyde, She wrot a lettre anon that thus began: . . . But who wol al this letter have in mynde, RedeOvyde, and in hym he shal it fynde. (1350-67) Chaucer, The Legend of Good Women

12. Ecquid, utadspectaeststudiosaelitteradextrae, Protinusestoculiscongnita nostra tuis– an, nisi legissesauctorisnominaSapphus, hoc brevenesciresundemovetur opus? (15.1-4) Ovid, Heroides15 “Sappho to Phaon” Tell me, when you looked upon the characters from my eager right hand, did your eye know immediately whose name they were – or, unless you had read their author’s name, Sappho, would you fail to know whence these brief words come?