Gorgias's Encomium to Helen as an Existential and Protreptic Logos: Self-reflexivity, Temporality, and the Four Causes

Abstract

Abstract: Gorgias's Encomium of Helen stands out as more than a display speech: it is a sophisticated statement on fifth century Greek life. Within a mythic framework, it presents Gorgias's post-Eleatic understanding of the world, including new ways of conceiving the logos within the finite boundaries of human life. I show how Gorgias's thoughts build out of Empedocles's cosmology and stylistics, leading Gorgias to consider more deeply how language and world go together. I demonstrate that the order of Gorgias's four causes is cyclical, which allows Gorgias to make gradated distinctions about responsibility. Gorgias's exploration of responsibility enables him to portray the world as something that continually marks and molds human being, and this includes the logos . Gorgias also addresses temporality, which not only imposes existential limits on human capacity but also contours language itself. Ultimately, the Helen conducts third-order (self-reflexive) thinking by marshalling a battery of rhetorical resources designed to attune an audience to how their own participation in the logos generates and sustains its powers. In effect, what the Helen is about is the work that the Helen does. Through a mixture of new insights into persuasion, language, temporality, and psychology, combined with self-reflexive rhetorical work, the Helen inspires further thought about key aspects of Greek existence.