In politics, finding the arguments is not enough: you also have to know how to match the words. Rhetoric is a broad discipline. Of course, you have to work on your argument, think about emotions. And, of course, it is crucial to think about the image that we send back. But indeed, the art of convincing is also deployed as close as possible to the text, in the selection of words and sounds. It is the anthology of Friday evening.
First statement: that of Jean-Baptiste Lemoyne, the Secretary of State for Tourism. He was, Friday, December 3, guest of the “4 Truths”, on France 2, and he insisted on the importance of the vaccine booster against the Covid-19: “We are better covered when we have the recall and the effectiveness of the recall, it is final.” It is a process that we have already crossed. We call it a paronomasis. The paronomasis is the figure which consists in using in the same sentence two words whose sounds are similar. It is often found in the proverbs: “who steals an egg, steals an ox”, for example. Or, like here: “The effectiveness of the recall is final.”
Moreover, this is far from the first time that the proximity between these two words has been used in the political field, as evidenced by this statement by Gabriel Attal, the government spokesman, on October 19 on RTL. : “It is very important for the people who are eligible to proceed with the recall. So this morning, yes, I am calling for the recall.” “A call to recall”: the formula is slightly different, but the process is the same.
What is the political function of this process? Is it purely a stylistic effect? No: there is a real rhetorical impact behind the style effect. The strength of paronomasis is that it creates an obvious effect. Because the words respond to each other, because the sounds match, we have the impression that the meaning flows naturally. To put it in one sentence: the elegance of resonances amplifies the power of reasoning. This is why we often find this process in proverbs: paronomases give them an appearance of evidence. If, instead of saying “who look alike, get together”, I say “who look alike, get along well”, all the strength of common sense is lost. And it is also true in politics: these formulas reinforce the pleas in favor of the vaccine booster, while saving part of the argument.
Beyond this in the game on the sounds, we can use two words whose sounds are not only close, but identical. This is what Eric Zemmour did, for example, on Tuesday, December 1, at the end of his interview with Gilles Bouleau. The far-right polemicist, now presidential candidate, felt that the TF1 journalist had not treated him fairly: “Mr. Bouleau did not do his job. Mr. Boulot wanted to play smart in front of his colleagues. Mr. Boulot … did not do his job.”
“Monsieur Bouleau did not do his job”: technically, it is no longer a paronomasis, but an antanaclase, that is to say the use of the same word, or of two homonyms, which are taken in two different senses. The classic example is “the heart has its reasons that reason ignores”. “Its reasons”, that is to say its reasons, its justifications. The reason, that is to say the intellect. In terms of the effect produced, the antanaclase is close to the paronomase, it is above all an obvious effect. With a small nuance: as the figure is more visible, it is also more likely to become caricatured.
With Eric Zemmour, it was already borderline. Some will judge the twist well put together, others will perceive it as already too strong. But here is the last extract, we owe it to Carole Delga, president of the Occitanie region. She was the guest of Jean-Jacques Bourdin on November 16: “We must leave time to time, a presidential campaign is a long-distance race and we must speak of the bottom to avoid hitting bottom”. Three in a row! The word “background” used in three different senses is exceptional. And it is undoubtedly also … too exceptional. The problem is that everyone sees the string, you can feel the prepared sentence two kilometers away, and it becomes more irritating than impacting.
Let us be careful, therefore, when we seek to employ rhetorical methods: the more they are effaced, the more effective they are. To paraphrase Gérard Colé, who was one of François Mitterrand’s communication architects: “Rhetoric is like cosmetic surgery. When it shows, it’s a failure.”