Thank You For Arguing, Revised and Updated Edition: What Aristotle, Lincoln, And Homer Simpson Can Teach Us About the Art of Persuasion

By Jay Heinrichs

Book Overview

The definitive guide to getting your way, revised and updated with new material on writing, speaking, framing, and other key tools for arguing more powerfully "Cross Cicero with David Letterman and... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0385347758
• ISBN13: 9780385347754
• Release Date: August 2013
• Publisher: Three Rivers Press
• Length: 432 Pages
• Weight: 1.01 lbs.
• Dimensions: 9.2" x 0.9" x 6.1"

Customer Reviews

Made me laugh

Heinrichs has a great sense of humor that made me learn his 100-plus "argument tools" almost without knowing it. When he described his own arguments with his wife and kids (and even his cat!), he made me laugh out loud. It's the most entertaining intellectual book I've read in years.

Keys to advertising and political campaigns

The book not only shows how to argue, it also reveals the tricks behind advertising and political campaigns. Heinrichs walks us through the basic rhetorical principles, starting with "ethos, pathos and logos," or character, emotion and logic. Character is the most important, he says, because your audience is much more likely to accept your point if it likes and trusts you. He shows how to construct the image of a leader to suit any audience--useful for anyone who manages people, or wants to.

This is an important book

Don't let the humor and readable tone fool you. Heinrichs makes a great case for restoring some of the forgotten rhetorical principles behind the Declaration of Independence and the U.S. Constitution. All the nation's founders had at least some training in rhetoric, he says. Our ignorance of it keeps us from restoring civility and sense to our national dialogue. This book should be required reading in high school and college.

Great Word Book

The chapter on figures of speech is worth the price alone. They help you come up with snappy answers and intelligent things to say when you normally freeze up. And they've helped me write better. Some of the terms can be a mouthful, like paralipsis, anadiplosis and diazeugma, but there's a glossary in the back. Plus you don't actually have to know the words themselves, just the principles behind them.