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Dramatic Irony
Definition of Ethos
Ethos, along with logos and pathos, is one of the three "modes of persuasion" in rhetoric (the art of effective speaking or writing). Ethos is an argument that appeals to... read full definition
Ethos, along with logos and pathos, is one of the three "modes of persuasion" in rhetoric (the art of effective speaking or writing). Ethos is... read full definition
Ethos, along with logos and pathos, is one of the three "modes of persuasion" in rhetoric (the art of effective... read full definition
Part 1: Perhaps an Accident
Explanation and Analysis—The Omniscient Narrator:
In The Bridge of San Luis Rey, the omniscient narrator uses ethos, a form of persuasion based on credibility and authority. After a bridge collapse in Lima kills five people, Brother Juniper decides to study the victims' lives and write a book about them in order to rationally explain why God allowed them to die. The first and last chapters of the book explain the origins and results of this quest, while the middle chapters, which represent the book Brother Juniper writes, tell the victims' stories leading up to the collapse.
All of these chapters are told by the omniscient narrator, who rarely speaks in the first person but claims to know much more about the characters' inner lives than even Brother Juniper can figure out. Outlining the priest's doomed quest to turn the victims' lives into a scientific proof of God's existence, the narrator says that,
[...] for all his diligence Brother Juniper never knew the central passion of Doña María’s life; nor of Uncle Pio’s, not even of Esteban’s.
Related Themes:
