The Rhetoric of Christopher Marlowe’s Tamburlaine Essays -- Christophe

The Rhetoric of Christopher Marlowes Tamburlaine The shooter of Christopher Marlowes Tamburlaine the Great did not lead the life of some(prenominal) normal Scythian shepherd. Throughout the course of the drama, the once lowly Tamburlaine is bent on a path of unstoppable conquest, upheld as much by aggravated personal charisma and power of speech as by the specialization of his sword. He exemplifies this eloquence throughout his many speeches in the play, not to the lowest degree of which is his Thirst of Reign address to the defeated usurper of the Persian crown. Tamburlaines speech is delivered with the intention of justifying, to Cosroe and all others present, the righteousness of his own ambitions, and inviting them to share in the similar. He achieves this end by skillfully employing in his speech Aristotles three canonized methods of persuasion logos, pathos, and ethos. Tamburlaine begins his address with a subtle intent of ethos, an ap peal to his own credibility as a leader good of respect. He does this by comparing his own desire for the sweetness of a crown to that of mighty Jove, who threw his father Ops down from the heavenly chair for this same reason. By this line of persuasion, Tamburlaine is following in the rattling footsteps of the mighty god, and fulfilling a goal established as worthy by a more or less divine precedent. This comparison serves to glorify his bloody path, and subtly clarifies him as a mighty persona in majestic uprising, not simply a violent, sheep-herding rebel. Tamburlaines bolstering of his own person is followed by a justification of the very act of ambitious conquest by means of logos, a sensible appeal to reason. He argues that NatureDoth teach us all to kick in aspiring... ...nd morally questionable to audience and readers alike. The depiction of ruthless conquest as an admirable and heroic endeavor could only be done successfully if it were shielded by lan guage as beautiful as it is fit of persuasion. Despite this quality of speech, there is a certain weakness in the address that the modern reader is privy to the idea of four militant elements composing our frames is quaintly erroneous. Aristotle himself would be quick to point out that a logical argument based on faulty assumptions is a faulty argument, so Tamburlaines use of logos in this speech peal somewhat hollow on ears which can pick out the fault in his persuasions. Not that this flaw would come as a bewilderment to an educated modern reader, as they would likely already distrust any justification of violent domination that history has repeatedly shown to be far from admirable.