Savannah Brady

4th period

Rhetorical Analysis
Hail Cicero, a Death and Afterlife
By E.J. Hutchinson
https://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/hail-cicero-a-death-and-afterlife/

Writing in 2017, E.J. Hutchinson is concerned that “He” (Cicero) “couldn't save the

Roman republic, but his writing crossed centuries to help inspire ours.” (Hutchinson, title

paragraph). Humanitie needs writing in order to communicate effectively with each other. In the

article E.J Hutchinson was talking about why Cicero’s writing is important, but if Cicero did

anything that was an inspiration to society it would be his political power on the Roman republic.

E.J. Hutchinson is qualified to talk about writing and more importantly, why a citrian

person and their writing influenced writing today, because he is associate professor of Classics

and a director of the Collegiate Scholars Program at Hillsdale College. The Collegiate Scholars

Program helps students from underrepresented schools to apply and succeed in college. His

research focuses on the reception of classical literature in late antiquity and early modernity.

Although he is qualified to write this, he probably should’ve chosen a different person to write

about. Some of the stuff he said didn’t quite match what he was trying to answer.

E.J. Hutchinson has excellent credibility because he pretty much studies writings of

people/philosophers from the olden days and that successfully builds on that ethos by puting why

he is the perfect person writing this at the bottom of his writing. Giving the readers some

credibility of who you are, what you do, and why you do it helps them fully listen to your

writing. Knowing what you are writing about is another source of credibility because not only
are you teaching other people to know what you know, you are building your understanding of

the subject and get a deeper understanding.

It is possible to characterize the readers for E.J. Hutchinson’s article as people who want

to learn about why this man is important and why it matters that he is dead. Hail Cicero, a Death

and Afterlife may or may not meet their expectations because Hail Cicero, a Death and Afterlife

is about the death of Cicero and doesn’t show you very much about who Cicero was, what he

did while he was alive, and why exactly he is important. Cicero was a statesman, orator, and

philosopher–and the symbolic end of the Roman Republic. The reading had nothing to do with

why Cicero’s writing was a good function is society.

E.J. Hutchinson appeals to the audience effectively. For example, when he discusses why

Cicero is so important, he argues that just because this one guy from that time period got to learn

all these things about philosophy just because of Cicero's writing, then Cicero must have a great

writing method. (Hutchinson). E.J Hutchinson would uses words like philosophy and/or phrases

like early Renaissance, to appeal to the readers’ interest of those two topics. Having both

combined into one place would help get more people to read the article. It would also help

people if they are trying to write an essay about one of these topics that they can get some sort of

an idea.

As the republic was dying, Cicero wanted to flee because of the death of his nephew and

younger brother but soon decided to stay. He then was talking to a man named Plutarch and he

decided to leave 50 miles north of Naples. But there was already assassins trying to find him.

Soon after a man named Antony had sent people out to get the hands and head of Cicero. E.J

Hutchinson believes that Cicero’s readings are important because of Cicero’s writings, it sent
Augustine on the path of philosophy. Cicero’s speeches are supposed to be models of rhetorical

construction and power. Hutchinson talks about Cicero’s writing only in one paragraph then goes

onto a different topic that has nothing to do with modern society or why his writing is important.

E.J. Hutchinson has relied heavily on pathos and uses of the reader very effectively to

convince his readers that emotion can sometimes go hand and hand in writing something very

important. For example in the first paragraph he brings up Pearl Harbor (Hutchinson). Pearl

Harbor was a tough time for people back during WWII because it killed multiple of innocent

Americans and forced America into a war that otherwise Americans would’ve tried to avoid.

Another example of pathos is when E.J. Hutchinson is talking about the crows that are flying

towards Cicero (Hutchinson). This is a good example because Hutchinson tries to show you the

image of the crows flying to Cirero to also get the reader scared for your life as well. Also the

idea that Hutchinson was trying to show was the way that Cicero was scared of his impending

doom (Hutchinson). This is also a part of pathos because people are scared of death and will find

anyway possible to try and stop it from happening. But in the end it doesn’t matter because

death, or in this cases crows, will soon catch up to you and you will have to face it.

While E.J. Hutchinson uses a mix of bringing what the reading has to offer the age of

today and why Cicero is fully important. Some examples of this is, “For our culture is one that is

obsessed with the idols of youth and beauty, with novelty and appearance,” (Hutchinson). In

today's world, it’s true that mostly everyone is worried about what they are going to look like

and when they don’t like something they cover it up with makeup or surgery. We could look at

the Kardasians for an example. These women were just like normal society that you would see

on the street, until they were picked up by the media and they started to get plastic surgery and

started making makeup brands.

 Another example of this is “it is natural, then, that old age is a thing to be dreaded and

deferred at all costs: it means idleness or boredom, weakness and fatigue, flaccidity and flab,

along with a concomitant lack of physical pleasures, and, ultimately, death,” (Hutchinson).

People fear death because that means that life is telling them something that they try to run from:

You have lived your life but it is time to move on. And for other people it means: You are going

to be stuck in blackness because there is nothing after death.

Another example is, “We have lost the principle of meaningful connection with the past,

and with it any notion of the significance of the old and what they might have to teach us,”

(Hutchinson). Most people could care less about the history of the past because they only want to

focus on what is to come. But there is a lot to learn for the past people, art and building. There

was even a man who read the writings of a dead man and now loves the Philosophy of Cicero. So

the writer is trying to say that, just because you don’t like learning about the past you have to

learn about it because it helps make you a better person.

E.J. Hutchinson’s argument about why Cicero’s writings are important would have been

persuasive to readers of The American Conservative because Death would’ve caught their

attention and tried to wonder why death would have something to do with someone and their

writing.

Word Count: 1270

 Work cited

Hutchinson, E.J. “Hail Cicero, a Death and Afterlife.” The American Conservative, 8 Dec. 2017,
https://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/hail-cicero-a-death-and-afterlife/.