Copia: Foundations Of The Abundant Style - Wikipedia

1512 rhetoric textbook by Erasmus

This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed.Find sources: "Copia: Foundations of the Abundant Style" – news · newspapers · books · scholar · JSTOR (December 2016) (Learn how and when to remove this message)

Part of a series on
Rhetoric
History Ancient Greece Asianism Atticism Attic orators Calliope Sophists Ancient India Ancient Rome The age of Cicero Second Sophistic Middle Ages Byzantine rhetoric Trivium Renaissance Studia humanitatis Modern period
Concepts Captatio benevolentiae Chironomia Decorum Delectare Docere Device Eloquence Eloquentia perfecta Eunoia Enthymeme Facilitas Fallacy Informal Figure of speech Scheme Trope Five canons Inventio Dispositio Elocutio Memoria Pronuntiatio Hypsos Imitatio Kairos Method of loci Modes Operations Persuasion Ethos Pathos Logos Situation Style Grand Sotto voce Topos
Genres Apologetics Debate Declamation Controversia Deliberative Demagogy Dialectic Socratic method Dissoi logoi Elocution Epideictic Encomium Panegyric Eulogy Farewell speech Forensic Funeral oration Homiletics‎ Sermon Invitational Lecture Public Lightning talk Maiden speech Oratory Polemic Diatribe Eristic Philippic Progymnasmata Suasoria Propaganda Spin Resignation speech Stump speech War-mongering
Criticism Cluster Dramatic Pentadic Frame Genre Ideological Metaphoric Mimesis Narrative Neo-Aristotelian
Rhetoricians Aeschines Aelius Aristides Antiphon Aristotle Aspasia Augustine Bakhtin Booth Brueggemann Burke Cicero de Man Demosthenes Derrida Dio Chrysostom Erasmus Gorgias Hobbes Hypereides Isocrates Lucian Lysias McLuhan Ong Perelman Pizan Protagoras Quintilian Ramus Richards Seneca the Elder Smith Toulmin Vico Weaver
Works Gorgias (380 BC) Phaedrus (c. 370 BC) Rhetoric (c. 350 BC) Rhetoric to Alexander (c. 350 BC) De Sophisticis Elenchis (c. 350 BC) Topics (c. 350 BC) De Inventione (84 BC) Rhetorica ad Herennium (80 BC) De Oratore (55 BC) A Dialogue Concerning Oratorical Partitions (c. 50 BC) De Optimo Genere Oratorum (46 BC) Orator (46 BC) On the Sublime (c. 50) Institutio Oratoria (95) Panegyrici Latini (100–400) Dialogus de oratoribus (102) De doctrina Christiana (426) De vulgari eloquentia (1305) Copia: Foundations of the Abundant Style (1521) Language as Symbolic Action (1966) A General Rhetoric (1970)
Subfields Argumentation Cognitive Contrastive Constitutive Digital Feminist Native American New Health and medicine Pedagogy Procedural Science Technology Therapy Visual Composition
Related Ars dictaminis Communication studies Composition studies Doxa Glossary of rhetorical terms Glossophobia List of feminist rhetoricians List of speeches Oral skills Orator Pistis Public rhetoric Rhetoric of social intervention model Rhetrickery Rogerian argument Seduction Speechwriting Talking point TED Terministic screen Toulmin model Wooden iron
v t e

Copia: Foundations of the Abundant Style (Latin: De Utraque Verborum ac Rerum Copia) is a rhetoric textbook[1] written by Dutch humanist Desiderius Erasmus, and first published in 1512. It was a best-seller widely used for teaching how to rewrite pre-existing texts, and how to incorporate them in a new composition.[1] Erasmus systematically instructed on how to embellish, amplify, and give variety to speech and writing.

Production and publication

[edit]

The first official edition of De Copia, titled De duplici copia rerum ac verborum commentarii duo, was published by Josse Bade in Paris in 1512 and helped establish Erasmus as a major humanist scholar.[2] Erasmus began conceiving the work much earlier, in the 1490s, during a time when creating style manuals for school boys was considered to be a noble calling.[3] It is widely believed that Erasmus left a working copy of the manuscript behind after a trip to Italy (1506–1509) and, upon hearing that an unauthorized version was forthcoming, quickly produced a version to thwart the effort.[3] Though he was reluctant to publish the work in haste, Erasmus hoped to avoid being associated with what he called "a thoroughly bad text" and ultimately produced "the lesser evil of the two".[4] The early draft version of the text that was left behind in Italy is written as a dialogue between two students and is titled Brevis de Copia Praeceptio; it was eventually printed in 1519 as an appendix to the Formulae.[5]

Erasmus did not feel that his work was fully complete with the 1512 edition of De Copia, and he continued to update the work throughout his life. The general concept and structure of the work remained the same over time, even as Erasmus amended and expanded the text.[6] Subsequent authorized editions of De Copia were published in December 1514 (in a volume which also included the Parabolae), April 1517, May 1526, and August 1534.[6]

Contents

[edit]

Book 1 of De Copia (on verbum or words) contains Erasmus' thoughts on the abundance of expression and is divided into 206 short chapters or sections. The initial chapters concern themselves with general commentary on copia, its advantages, and its importance. Chapters 11–32 then detail twenty methods/varieties of expression, while the remaining chapters provide further examples of variety of expression.

Book 2 (on rerum or argument) deals with abundance of subject matter which Erasmus says, "involves the assembling, explaining, and amplifying of arguments by the use of examples, comparisons, similarities, dissimilarities, opposites, and other like procedures which I shall treat in detail in the appropriate place".[7]

Book I:

Chapters 1–12 A discussion of the general nature and value of the abundant style

Chapters 13 – 33 An analysis of major tropes in classical literature: synecdoche, equivalence, allegory, etc. Chapter 33 is a famous demonstration of variety, where Erasmus illustrates 195 variations on the sentence, "Your letter delighted me greatly." (Latin: Tuae litterae me magnopere delectarunt.)[8]

Chapters 34–94 Feature variations of grammatical and syntactic forms

Chapters 94 – 206 Operate like a Thesaurus, although the organization is haphazard, not alphabetical

Book II : Abundance of Subject Matter

Not divided into chapters, but does address 11 separate methods of using abundant subject matter. Here Erasmus uses a more dialectical approach, and typically gives a few lines of theory followed by many illustrations from classical sources.

Themes and ideas

[edit]

Erasmus' purpose was to contribute to the existing scholarship on style.[9] To that end, he put forth in De Copia that style must be abundant in order to be effective, and that the abundance consists of two primary elements: variety of expression and variety of subject matter. Variety, he says, "is so powerful in every sphere that there is absolutely nothing, however brilliant, which is not dimmed if not commended by variety".[10]

Written as both a manual on rhetoric and as a treatise against what Erasmus believed to be the "false copia" of the time that was inspired by an overwhelming admiration of the texts of Cicero, De Copia operates in multiple rhetorical spheres, for multiple purposes: mainly as a style guide for students and as an example of Erasmus' rhetorical virtuosity.[11]

Sources and influences

[edit]

Erasmus wrote Copia while a professor at the University of Cambridge in 1511. He was teaching Greek, but between courses composed several texts designed to instruct Latin. Copia was one such text, perhaps as an attempt to expand on Quintillian's rhetorical guide, Institutio Oratoria.

The first chapter of book 10 in Quintillian's Oratoria is titled "De copia verborum". This is quite possibly where Erasmus received his most direct inspiration for the book. In that 10th chapter, Quintillian declined to give examples for employing the abundant style, on the grounds that each individual case requires a unique solution. This left the door open for Erasmus to detail the abundant style in Copia.

Erasmus acknowledges Quintillian in the preface, and borrows from him (and other classical authors) throughout Copia, sometimes citing, sometimes not. As further revisions of Copia are printed, Erasmus becomes increasingly careful to give credit to previous authors where it is due.

If Quintillian was the philosophical inspiration for Copia, his friend John Colet was most practically responsible. Colet and Erasmus had designs on replacing Medieval teaching with classical Greek and Latin writings. While Erasmus was at Cambridge, Colet was teaching at St. Paul's school in London. Colet requested that Erasmus pen something on rhetoric for him to teach at St. Paul's, and Erasmus presented him with Copia, dedicating the book to Colet in the preface.

Reception

[edit]

While designed as a university textbook, Copia enjoyed far broader appeal. The book was immensely popular in England and in Europe, at least 85 editions of the book were printed in Erasmus' own lifetime, and countless more after that. Erasmus made three separate revisions to the original text, adding chapters each time. The original 1512 edition contained 153 chapters, which swelled to 206 in the final version that Erasmus completed before his death.

See also

[edit]

• Exercises in Style, 20th century French book, illustrating variations
• Commonplace book

Notes

[edit]

1. ^ a b Kenny (2011) p.57
2. ^ Knott 282.
3. ^ a b Knott 280.
4. ^ Erasmus 288.
5. ^ Callahan 100.
6. ^ a b Knott 281.
7. ^ Erasmus 301.
8. ^ And 203 variations on "Always, as long as I live, I shall remember you" addressed to Thomas More.
9. ^ Kennedy 206.
10. ^ Erasmus 302.
11. ^ Callahan 106.

References

[edit]

• Callahan, Virginia W. "The De Copia: The Bounteous Horn". Essays on the Work of Erasmus. Ed. Richard L. DeMolen. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1978. 99–109. Print.
• Erasmus, Desiderius. "Copia: Foundations of the Abundant Style (De duplici copia verborum ac rerum commentarii duo).” Collected Works of Erasmus, Vol. 24. Ed. Craig R. Thompson. Toronto, ON: University of Toronto Press, 1978. Print.
• Kennedy, George. Classical Rhetoric and Its Christian and Secular Tradition from Ancient to Modern Times. Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 1980. Print.
• Kenny, Neil. "Making sense of intertextuality" in O'Brien (2011) "The Cambridge Companion to Rabelais"
• Knott, Betty (trans.). "Copia: Foundations of the Abundant Style (De duplici copia verborum ac rerum commentarii duo).” Collected Works of Erasmus, Vol. 24. Ed. Craig R. Thompson. Toronto, ON: University of Toronto Press, 1978. Print.

External links

[edit]

•  Latin Wikisource has original text related to this article: De copia verborum

v t e Erasmus of Rotterdam
Works
Original works	Prosopopeia Britanniae (1499) Handbook of a Christian Knight (1501) In Praise of Folly (1509) Copia: Foundations of the Abundant Style (1512) Julius Excluded from Heaven (1514) The Education of a Christian Prince (1516) Paraphrases of Erasmus (1517–1524) Colloquies (1518) The Freedom of the Will (1524) Ciceronianus (1528) Exposytion of the Commune Creed (1533) Ecclesiastes of Erasmus (1535)
Translations	Adagia (1500) Textus Receptus (1516) Apophthegmatum opus (1539)
Related topics	The first tome or volume of the Paraphrase of Erasmus vpon the newe testamente (1548) Praemium Erasmianum Foundation Erasmus Prize
Category

v t e Appropriation in the arts
By field	Music Bootleg recording Chopped and screwed Contrafact list Contrafactum Cover version DJ mix Interpolation Medley Music mashup Music plagiarism Musical quotation Nightcore Parody music Pasticcio Plunderphonics Potpourri Quodlibet Remix Riddim Sampling Sound collage Standard Tribute act Trope Variation Vaporwave Literature / theatre Assemblage Cut-up technique Flarf poetry Found poetry Jukebox musical Trope Verbatim theatre Visual arts Collage Combine painting Photographic mosaic Readymades of Marcel Duchamp Swipe By source material Mona Lisa Michelangelo's David Michelangelo's Pietà Statue of Liberty Cinema / television / video Abridged series Anime music video Collage film Found footage Literal music video Parody film Re-cut trailer Remake Shot-for-shot Supercut TV format Vidding Video mashup YouTube Poop Other arts In-joke Internet meme Joke theft Parody advertisement Revivalism (architecture) Video game modding
General concepts	Intertextual figures Allusion Calque Parody Pastiche Plagiarism Quotation Translation Adaptation Film Literary Theatre Other concepts After (art) Assemblage (art) Bricolage Citation Détournement Found object Homage Imitation in art Mashup Reprise Satire Source criticism in the arts
Related artisticconcepts	Aesthetic interpretation Anti-art Archetypal literary criticism Artistic inspiration "The Death of the Author" Divine inspiration Afflatus Genius (literature) Muses Fan labor Fan fiction Genre Genre studies Originality Simulacrum Western canon
Standard blocksand forms	Archetype Formula fiction Genre fiction Jazz standard Plot device Stock character Story structure
Epoch-markingworks	L.H.O.O.Q. (1919) "Pierre Menard, Author of the Quixote" (1939) Reality Hunger: A Manifesto (2010)
Theorization	Dada De Copia Rerum Diegesis Dionysian imitatio Mimesis Nachahmung Palimpsests: Literature in the Second Degree The Pictures Generation Pop art Postmodernism Russian formalism
Related non-artistic concepts	Academic dishonesty Appropriation in sociology Articulation in sociology Cultural appropriation History of printing Information society Intellectual property Copyright infringement Derivative work Fair use Meme Open source Participatory culture Pirate politics Recontextualisation Remix culture