Kenneth Lloyd-Jones, “Erasmus and Dolet on the Ethics of Imitation and the Hermeneutic Imperative,” IJCT 2 (1995-1996), pp. 27-44.

This article examines an area of interest (the rhetorical use of dissimulatio) shared by two of the most implacable adversaries in the humanist quarrel over the imitation of Ciceronian style, Erasmus and Etienne Dolet. This question is explored in the context of Erasmus’s commitment to the moral dimensions of imitatio (given his Christian hermeneutic), and Dolet’s convictions concerning the distinction between artistic endeavor and moral accountability. Some concluding thoughts are offered as to how such views reflect a Renaissance epistemology of language as communication, a perspective that continues to influence important aspects of modern critical and social theory.