CLST 205 Lecture Notes - Lecture 8: Ironism, Quackery, Lysistrata
1 Nov 2017
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Document Summary
Some people are so afraid of becoming quacks that they adopt the opposite strategy -> meiosis (understatement), and become ironists. Old comedy always contains a contest (agon) Quack meets the anti-quack, quack defeats him in argument, quack is driven off the stage and out of society by force. Quack"s nemesis = eiron(comes from the verb asking a question, eresthai) Down-to-earth right-thinking everyman who asks common sense questions that the quack can"t answer irony for us includes sarcasm -> unequal levels of knowledge. Aristotle says that the ironist speaks to avoid attracting fame to himself, they prefer small and obvious things, if gone overboard it can be quackery. Theophrastus agrees with aristotle but finds the type much more offensive than his master does ironist asks simple questions that open a gap in the knowledge. Clearest example of confrontation between quack and ironist is in clouds.
