“The Trivium by Sister Miriam Joseph, A Viable Alternative to Gottschall’s Proposal for Scientific Hegemony”

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Joseph, Sister Miriam.  The Trivium: The Liberal Arts of Logic, Grammar, and Rhetoric.  Marguerite McGlinn Ed.  Philadelphia: Paul Dry Books, 2002. 292 pp. $18.95

In a recent post, I oppose Jonathan Gottschall’s argument in favor of literary science, maintaining that Gottschall correctly perceives the general problems of contemporary literary criticism while also maintaining that his proposed solution is unwarranted.  I have not yet unfolded a constructive solution of my own, although I hinted that the solution is an art, really a synthesis of three liberal arts: grammar, logic, and rhetoric.  This review essay is my attempt to advance a much-needed alternative to Gottschall’s proposal, an alternative represented by Sister Miriam Joseph’s The Trivium.  If Gottschall desires evidence that is “Sure, Firm, Gradually Accumulated, New, Durable, Steadily Built, and Solid,” and not, “Theoretical, Speculative, Irrelevant, Wandering, Circuitous, or Bending to Fashion and the Pronouncements of False Leaders,” then he need not look outside the liberal arts (DucksandDrakes).  As Sister aptly demonstrates, verifiable data already exists within the arts of grammar, logic, and rhetoric; and that data is a sufficient pool of evidence from which to draw interpretive conclusions.  It behooves literary critics, then, both to cultivate these arts by teaching them in the university and to employ them in their own research and writing.  

I will outline briefly the content of The Trivium, after which I will note the relevance of Sister’s methodology, along with a few critiques.

Sister begins with two introductory chapters, “The Liberal Arts” and “The Nature and Function of Language.”  In the first, she discusses the distinction between trivium (grammar, logic, and rhetoric) and quadrivium (arithmetic, music, geometry, and astronomy).  The trivium, she argues, is a synthesis of “three arts of language pertaining to the mind,” while the quadrivium is a synthesis of “four arts of quantity pertaining to matter” (3).  She then proffers a taxonomy of each individual art in relation to the liberal arts as a whole.  In the second chapter, Sister delineates the imitative and symbolic nature of language, as well as its logical, psychological, and phonetic aspects.     

Three chapters on grammar follow: “General Grammar,” which surveys the parts of speech and syntax; “Terms and their Grammatical Equivalents: Definition and Division,” which surveys the classification, extension, and intension of terms; and “Propositions and their Grammatical Expression,” which surveys proposition and predication. 

Passing from grammar to logic, Sister provides three chapters on deductive logic that address syllogism and the relations of simple, hypothetical, and disjuncitive propositions.   These chapters thoroughly address deductive logic and are the book’s greatest strength.  Then follows a chapter on logical fallacies, and then one on inductive logic. 

Lamentably, Sister gives rhetoric short shrift.  A single chapter, “Composition and Reading,” is all she offers.  Someone should augment The Trivium by writing new chapters on rhetoric; Sister leaves ample opportunity.  Another, though minor, critique is Sister’s hierarchical style and organization.  Though her taxonomy is well-wrought and its clarity is one of the book’s strengths, it can also grow tiresome for lack of narrative.  A new Trivium would do well to weave together Sister’s precise categories and a cogent line of argumentation.  Still, The Trivium stands on its own because it is a repository of wisdom vital to the success of literary criticism.  I ardently recommend it.

Now to the point: why is The Trivium a viable alternative to Gottschall’s proposal for scientific hegemony?  Because Sister’s interpretive criteria are simultaneously literary and verifiable.  First, The Trivium is distinctively literary because Sister does not abstract logic but roots it in language.  Language humanizes logic because it allows logic to mingle with the psychological, rhetorical, and poetic realities that exist in human experience.  Sister’s approach to logic is thus a valuable corrective to Gottschall’s borrowing from the sciences, which are properly concerned with isolating quantities of matter and not integrating qualities of mind.  Second, The Trivium proffers verifiable criteria for interpretation because Sister explicates the intricacies of language with exquisite precision.  Once inculcated in the arts of language, the literary critic has not just sufficient data for analysis, but a surfeit.  The evidence provided by the arts of language is ”Sure, Firm, Gradually Accumulated, New, Durable, Steadily Built, and Solid,” as Gottschall demands.  A syllogism is either valid or invalid, a sentence grammatically either correct or not, an essay either persuasive or not.  Knowing the difference requires dedication to the arts of language, which provide premises from which we draw conclusions about texts.  

If Gottschall disagrees with his discipline, if he feels constricted by the duties of a literary critic, then that is unfortunate.  He should not burden himself with the title, for he has already renounced it in practice.

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Tags: Art, Education, grammar, humanities, jonathan gottschall, liberal arts, logic, rhetoric, trivium