The WPs planned for the first year of the work plan were WP1, WP2 and concomitant work on WP5.
WP1 consisted of identifying, by close reading of ancient rhetorical sources, criteria which could, in turn, make it possible to identify examples of ekphraseis or uses of enargeia in non-strictly rhetorical sources. This has been made easier thanks to bibliographical research and recent work by scholars like Andrew Feldherr, Vincent Huitink, Jonas Grethlein and Rutger Allan, which have shown connections between ancient enargeia and embodied cognition theory and narrative immersion. These innovative approaches helped me to improve the quality of my reading and to widen the relevant criteria (both thematic and formal, like typical scenes, expressions, and linguistic devices); I have been able to develop and doing so, developing a new method to approach historical works and trying to identify the use of a rhetorical technique. As a result, I have written a paper involving methodological reflection, which will soon be published in the volume mentioned in the next section. I hope that it will open the way to further research on the uses of enargeia (in other literary genres, for instance).
WP2 consisted of applying the above-mentioned criteria and method to historical works contemporary to the Second Sophistic. As I explained in the application documents, though the use of enargeia has been noticed in historians of this period, it is hard to find rhetorical studies on these authors and on the way they actually use the technique (mostly because, from an historical point of view, rhetoric has often been considered as an obstacle to truth). Due to the speciality of the host team, and according to the work plan, I have given priority to Greek historians, and more precisely the so-called Greek historians of Rome: Josephus, Cassius Dio, Appian and Herodian. This research has not only permitted me to unveil specific uses of the technique for some scenes (for instance Cassius Dio often uses extended battle descriptions with enargeia, while Appian maintain a causal and narrative structure and uses enargeia for secondary aspects; Herodian disseminates symbolic and visual clues, especially in murder scenes), but also to establish strong (lexical) connections with exercise manuals and models (like Ps.-Libanios’s models of descriptions). This WP resulted in several presentations in international conferences and the organisation of an international conference on the uses of enargeia in Greek and Latin historians at the Université de Lille. A collective volume, gathering the papers of this conference, will soon be published and I am currently preparing a monograph gathering my research and observations on the above-mentioned authors.
Concomitantly, WP5 consisted of decontextualising the technique and using its features in order to build and test exercises in high schools. This part of the research represents the emerging and promising field of experimental rhetoric, but it is also the first national experiment on enargeia at this level and at such length. Thanks to a partnership with a local high school (Lycée Vandermeersch in Roubaix) and teacher, and first attempts made in January 2022, a set of experiments took place from March to May 2023. The pupils were first introduced to the technique during five course sessions, including two written tasks involving the use of the technique on different topics, and even in a small speech contest. This experiment gave very encouraging results: the pupils were not only able to recognise and reproduce the technique, but also developed a critical look at other productions as well as on their own.
