SOURCE: Lindberg, Mary Klinger. “Stylistic Strategies in William Hogarth's Theatrical Satires.” In The Question of Style in Philosophy and the Arts, edited by Caroline Van Eck, James McAllister, and Renée Van de Vall, pp. 50-69. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995.

In the following essay, Lindberg examines Hogarth's technique of borrowing narrative and satiric strategies from eighteenth-century theater in his paintings and engravings.

The study of rhetorical or persuasive strategies in literary works is now well established. Less known are the stylistic strategies at work in the domain of graphic art. What is the relation between stylistic strategies in these different domains? Are they specific to graphic art, or are they common to modes of expression in general? And what is meant by ‘stylistic strategy’?

One approach to answering these questions is to focus on the use of theatre in the arts. It is well known, for instance, that...