To some people "rhetoric" suggests empty verbiage; to others, a clever way of telling lies; or even a baffling sturggle with Graeco-Roman names for complicated verbal devices. This book seeks to dispel the unfavourable notions associated with the term "rhetoric", and to replace them with a view of rhetoric as a form of wit, a psychological instrument, an aesthetic pleasure, a framework for argument, and above all as a technique informing not only the complex patterns of literary art but also the conduct of everyday transactions.