Full text of the paper:
Collected Papers of the Faculty of Law, University of Novi Sad
2017, vol. 51, No. 1, pp. 99–113
Language of the paper: Serbian
Original scientific paper
udk: 808.5(497.11)
doi: 10.5937/zrpfns51-13596
Author:
Sima Avramović, Ph. D., Full Professor
University of Belgrade
Faculty of Law Belgrad
sima@ius.bg.ac.rs
Abstract:
The author analyzes characteristics, importance and impact of the celebrated book Rhetoric from 1933, written by a famous Serbian lawyer and comedy writer Branislav Nusic. The a. points to shortage of literature about rhetoric among the Serbs in Hungary, and afterwards in Serbia, pointing that the most important book about rhetoric in XIX century was written not before 1844, also by a comedy writer, lawyer and one of the first law professors Jovan Sterija Popovic (but it was saved as a manuscript, which was published after 150 years in 1995). He also points to the position of rhetoric and of the literature about rhetoric in the world in the last centuries. He delineates route from the time when rhetoric entered into a crisis due to its formal and infertile approach up to appearance of the “new rhetoric” in a wider meaning (differing it from Perelman’s “new rhetoric” in the strict sense), namely until appearance of the modern “public speaking” approach and impact of Dale Carnegie. The a. finds many examples where Nusic’s Rhetoric reflects his commitment to classical rhetoric, but also recognizes important steps toward its modernization. His attempt to update classical rhetoric was performed cautiously and with a proper measure. Therefore the a. is of opinion that it was Nusic’s most important advantage, virtue and contribution. The flow of time has shown that it was his specific contribution to the identity of this discipline among the Serbs, as many generations were educated on his book, until our times. It is due to excellent concept and harmonious compound of classical rhetoric and elements of rhetoric from the first half of XX century. The a. compares Nusic with a modern American scholar Edward Corbett who claimed that classical rhetoric is still useful and effective – perhaps more useful and effective than the various courses of study that replaced it. Finally the a. points to dangers of unrefined public speaking trends. He insists that, upon Nusic’s identity trace, rhetoric should be based still our times upon proper combination of classical rhetoric values and experiences of the new, public speaking, applied rhetoric.
Keywords:
Classical rhetoric. – New rhetoric. – Public speaking. – Sterija. – Edward Corbett.