Quote: "During this time and in pursuit of her spiritual goals, Catherine authored over 382 letters, 26 prayers, and the Dialogue, a rich and deceptively straightforward colloquy between her soul and God, which she called simply Il Libro, The Book"
Question: Out of the rhetoricians we have studied, who is Catherine comparable to?
Hey there Brier! I think that Catherine is pretty unique, and I'm not sure if she's comparable to a rhetorical theorist, as she did not compose any new theoretical research regarding rhetoric. However, I think that if we were forced to pick someone, I'd compare her most to Plato's depiction of Socrates. Socrates was a huge proponent of transcendent truth, which could be compared to Catherine's lifelong search for Divine truth. I think that Catherine could also be compared to the Sophists, but only in the way that she traveled a lot, as the Sophists were known to wander from city to city. Other than that, I think that Catherine stands alone in her own category as a "living mirror" for other women of the middle ages. She was a feminist of sorts and an intense devotee to her God, and her life and works (being inseparable) converge to label her entire existence in humanity as a "body identity." I hope that wasn't confusing!
ReplyDeleteI agree with Cassidy, I think that it is difficult to compare Catherine to a rhetorist because her views and actions seem a lot more drastic and out of line with that of a philosopher. On the other hand, I would say that the closest rhetorician in my opinion to Catherine would be Aristotle. I think that his views on the empirical truth and how it is so directly learned from experience, not from within us is something that closely aligns with Catherine's view that the Bible was directly instructing her to submit her body through means of subduing her voice.
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