Lewes' Letter

The letter from Marian Evans Lewes to Melusina Fay Peirce shows a true understanding Lewes’ understanding and personal usage of rhetorical devices that aided in her success as a writer. She uses hypophora, conduplicato and (in a type of personalized language usage) allusions to her own work. Using such devices Lewes establishes her position on the development of a writer in a sophisticated and organized manner.
Hypophora is a when a writer raises one or more questions and then answers them, often at length, in their writing. We see this used in the second paragraph and nineteenth line when Lewes’ states, “Does this seem melancholy? I think it is less melancholy than any sort of self flattery.” She is referring to the idea that when one writes, one is not creating, but letting themselves serve as a vehicle for the development of an idea and one’s ignorance has really only let it be a fraction of that which it could possible exist as. She ...