SOURCE: “Persuasion and Drama,” in Rhetoric in the Plays of Thomas Dekker, Institut für Englishe Sprach und Literatur, 1972, pp. 28-65.

In the following chapter from her study of the elements of formal rhetoric in Dekker's works, Blow identifies the rhetorical devices used for persuasion and argumentation.

Except for prologues, aside, and the like, every speech in a play is directed at a dual audience: the theatre audience and the character or characters to whom it is addressed in dramatic context. When Dekker intended a speech to achieve a persuasive purpose within his story framework, he customarily exployed rhetorical figures and principles decorously selected to fit the character of the speaker and the dramatic situation. In regard to the theatre audience, he skillfully utilized the persuasive devices of rhetoric to move the spectators to sympathize with or react against certain characters or themes. In a very basic sense...