cfp.english.upenn.edu

The Sophist’s Cookbook: Recipes for Rhetoricians

When Plato was discounting rhetoric in the Gorgias, he called it the counterpart to cookery.

"[Rhetoric] seems to me then… to be a pursuit that is not a matter of art, but showing a shrewd, gallant spirit which has a natural bent for clever dealing with mankind…
Now, you have heard what I state rhetoric to be—the counterpart of cookery in the soul, acting here as that does on the body."
(Plato, Gorgias, c. 385 B.C.)

As a result, a few rhetoricians have decided to put together a cookbook named for the Sophists, the group of rhetoricians that Plato himself discounted so harshly.

This is a call for clever recipes that would fit with the theme of the collection. We are looking for some of your favorites with titles such as “Socratic Stew,” “The 5 Canon Margarita,” or “Casuistic Taffy.” Other kinds of recipes are welcome, such as “How to Make a Puncept” or actual recipes you have discovered from an archive. You may also wish to add a 500-word or so accompanying commentary as a companion piece to your recipe in addition to a photograph of the dish or a public domain image from an archive.

See an example: Saint Augustine’s Pear Pie, http://db.tt/HymYKnjT

Proposals for contributions to the book collection are invited for submission by April 30, 2013. The book will be on at least a two-year development schedule until it is finally released.

The vision for this collection is that it will offer a mixture of writings, seated around an ample collection of rhetorical recipes from a diverse group in the field, new and renowned alike.

Contact: Jimmy Butts (jimmy.m.butts@gmail.com)

Submissions should be e-mailed as Word attachments.
Please put “TSC: Your Name” as the subject of your message.

We have a contract to publish the collection with Parlor Press.