Abstract
Pasquil the Playue, a dialogue written by the English Humanist Thomas Elyot (1490-1546), was inspired by Elyot’s unsuccessful experience as a counselor to Henry VIII. Seizing on this biographical context, historians have read the dialogue as a product of Elyot’s disillusionment, identifying Elyot with the blunt, truth-telling Pasquil. In contrast this paper reads Pasquil the Playne as a multi-voiced Lucianic dialogue, which gives expression to several perspectives on the rhetoric of counsel. This reading problematizes questions of appropriateness (prepon) and right timing (kairos) in giving advice to a prince. Moreover, Elyot exploits the open-ended spirit of the Lucianic dialogue to attempt to develop in the reader the prudential reasoning (phronesis) essential to wise counsel.
- Journal
- Rhetorica
- Published
- 2012-01-01
- DOI
- 10.1353/rht.2012.0034
- CompPile
- Open Access
- Closed
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