Problems of Editing and Dating of the Course of Rhetoric by Theophanes Prokopowicz: The Publication of Russian Translation

Abstract

[Rev. of: Theophanes Prokopowicz. Ten Books on Rhetorical Art. Trans. by G. A. Stratanovsky, ed. by S. I. Nikolaev, E. V. Markasova, E. V. Vvedenskaya. Moscow, St. Petersburg: Alyans-Arkheo, 2020. 488 pp. (in Russian)] The book under review is the first edition of the Russian translation of the course of rhetoric, which was taught in Latin by Theophanes Prokopowicz in Kyiv-Mohyla College. This course was translated in the 1960s by the famous translator George Stratanovsky. It was supplied with a detailed and interesting commentary by Elena Markasova and published as a high-quality edition. But the fact that the publication had been done before the critical edition of the Latin text appeared limits the chances to use Russian translation for further research, and only the presence of the excellent commentary allows to label this edition academic. The main points in the review are questions of the dating of Prokopowicz’s Rhetoric, handwritten witnesses of this text (manuscript copies taken by students) and some text problems, with which researchers and editors of this monument of didactic literature have to deal.