NP; Good as Gold: rhetorical questions

[Jochen Stremmel]

The question Lieberman reads – has written before he utters the maxim "No
more rhetorical questions" – is not rhetorical, at least not as rhetorical
as the famous one of Cicero »Quo usque tandem abutere, Catilina, patientia
nostra?« or Does the Pope shit in the woods? or this one from around 1970:
Does Rose Kennedy own a black dress? It has indeed several possible answers.

And if it were a rhetorical question, directly answered by the questioner,
the combination would be called Dialektikon. But that is not the case here.


Am So., 6. Jan. 2019 um 21:00 Uhr schrieb Mike Jing <
gravitys.rainbow.cn at gmail.com>:

> I should have mentioned that in the book, Lieberman was characterized as a
> poor writer who overly relies on rhetorical questions. So I thought this
> was an obvious joke on him. The problem is that the common Chinese
> translation of the term "rhetorical question" doesn't seem to include cases
> such as these, thus ruining the joke.
>
>
> On Sat, Jan 5, 2019 at 7:03 PM Mike Jing <gravitys.rainbow.cn at gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
> > Thanks for the reply. The reason why I asked was that there are two ways
> > to translate the term "rhetorical question" into Chinese and one of them
> > does not include the case in this passage. I guess that's what people
> > conventionally mean by rhetorical question, as you have mentioned, which
> > does not include hypophora. In any case, I thought there was a joke in
> > there, and also later where Lieberman changed the title of one of Gold's
> > articles into a long-winded (rhetorical?) question.
> >
> >
> > On Sat, Jan 5, 2019 at 6:34 PM <protomen at protonmail.com> wrote:
> >
> >> It is a question and it is rhetorical, so there's at least a minor joke
> >> in there, though I don't believe that's what people conventionally mean
> by
> >> rhetorical question nowadays. See "hypophora".
> >>
> >>
> >> ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐ Original Message ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐
> >> On Saturday, January 5, 2019 5:39 AM, Mike Jing <
> >> gravitys.rainbow.cn at gmail.com> wrote:
> >>
> >> > Just to make sure I got this right. In the following passage,
> Lieberman
> >> > first says "No more rhetorical questions", then immediately proves
> >> himself
> >> > wrong by using a rhetorical question in his own article. Is that
> >> correct?
> >> >
> >> > Producing from somewhere inside his soiled and rumpled clothing a copy
> >> of
> >> > the next issue of his magazine, he swept open the pages until he at
> last
> >> > found the one he wanted, his regular feature boldly headlined “An
> >> Outspoken
> >> > Editor Speaks His Mind, by M. G. Lieberman, Editor.” “Listen to what
> >> I’ve
> >> > got coming up,” he cried with excitement and prepared to read. “No
> more
> >> > rhetorical questions,” he exclaimed and began, “‘What, then, shall we
> >> say
> >> > to those who argue this may lead us into war? I say, unflinchingly,
> then
> >> > let us have war.’ How’s that? I express nothing but opprobrium and
> scorn
> >> > for the failure of nerve of all the members of the cowardly Eastern
> >> liberal
> >> > establishment. That’s a phrase,” he could not hold himself back from
> >> > footnoting, “I got from Henry Kissinger.”
> >> >
> >> >
> >>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >> >
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> >>
> >>
> >>
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