ethopoeia

English

Alternative forms

• ethopoiia

Etymology

Borrowed from Ancient Greek ἠθοποιία (ēthopoiía). Equivalent to etho- +‎ -poeia.

Noun

ethopoeia (countable and uncountable, plural ethopoeiae or ethopoeias)

1. (uncountable) A rhetorical technique in which the speaker or author presents an imaginary speech by a real person, portraying that person's known characteristics and propensities.
   • 2003, George Alexander Kennedy, Progymnasmata: Greek Textbooks of Prose Composition and Rhetoric, →ISBN, page 165:

     The situation envisioned is the contest for a prize described in Herodotus 8.123 and cast in the form of ethopoeia.

   • 2014, Koen De Temmerman, Crafting Characters: Heroes and Heroines in the Ancient Greek Novel, →ISBN:

     In ancient narrative literature, ethopoeia is a frequently used literary tool.

   • 2015, David S. Thompson, Theatre Symposium, Vol. 23: Theatre and Youth, →ISBN, page 43:

     This is a reference to a type of drama-based pedagogy called ethopoeia, which formed a central component of the humanist grammar school curriculum.

2. (countable) An instance of this technique.
   • 1976, E. Michael Gerli, Alfonso Martínez de Toledo, →ISBN, page 115:

     In their ethopoeias of the ideal lover, de la Torre, Ribera, and Luduefia emphasize, as we have seen, eloquence, good physical proportions, youth, elegance, discretion and honesty.

   • 2001, Ralph W. Mathisen, Danuta Shanzer, Society and Culture in Late Antique Gaul, page 302:

     The speeches in the De Gelesuintha all can be described as ethopoeiae, that is speeches intended to communicate the emotional condition of their speakers.

   • 2003, George Alexander Kennedy, Progymnasmata, →ISBN:

     An ethopoeia is delimited by some few arguments from past, present, and future time, while exhortation, as an hypothesis dealing with acknowledged particulars, takes its amplification from final headings.

   • 2012, Irene Peirano, The Rhetoric of the Roman Fake, →ISBN, page 258:

     One of the most elaborate extant examples of this genre is a speech by Libanius, an ethopoeia of Medea as she is about to kill her children.

Translations

rhetorical technique of creating an imaginary speech

• French: éthopée (fr) f
• Occitan: etopèia f
• Spanish: etopeya (es) f