期刊名称：Rhetorical Review : The Electronic Review of Books on the History of rhetoric
印刷版ISSN：1901-2640
出版年度：2005
卷号：3
期号：03
页码：14-17
出版社：Pernille Harsting
摘要：In Rhetoric and Courtliness in Early Modern Literature, Jennifer Richards introduces and
discusses the concept of ‘civil conversation’ used in sixteenth-century courtesy literature.
Richards’ main purpose is to study the dialogue form of early modern conduct books and to
reconstruct the network of the readers of the courtesy books that were translated from Italian
into English. Richards’ aim is “to analyse how a group of humanists experimented with the
dialogue form to express their personal aspirations whilst simultaneously recognising alternative
and competing interests” (p. 3). She concentrates partly on a micro-level study of the use of the
concept of honestas (‘honesty’), but also makes macro-level conclusions about the influence of
major social changes on the individual and on the role of sociability in sixteenth-century English
society.
