POETICS

Aristotle

CONTENTS

About the Author

Purpose In Writing “Poetics”

Overview

Core Terms

Discussions

Criticisms

About the Author

Aristotle384 BC - 322 BC

Aristotle was a Greek philosopher who made important contributions by systemizing deductive logic and wrote on physical subjects. His philosophy had a long-lasting influence on the development of all Western philosophical theories.

The greatest universal genius of the ancient world, who studied and wrote on just about everything from metaphysics to botany, was also the founder of literary criticism. His Poetics is the most important work of literary which has survived the ancient world and the most influential of all his works.

About the Author

PURPOSES In Writing “POETICS”

1. To give advice on writing tragedy to contemporary poets.

2. To answer the objections of dramatic poetry expressed by his teacher Plato in the “Republic”

3. To explain why effective poetry has stayed with audiences for so long.

OVERVIEWPOETICS is an attempt to explain

the basic problems of art. The Poetics stands in opposition to the theory of art propounded by Plato in his Republic. It is the earliest-surviving work of dramatic theory (primarily focused on drama). His original work was divided into two parts, each book was written in separate papyrus. Only the 1st part which focuses on tragedy survives. The lost 2nd part was focused on comedy.

Core TERMS Mimesis – imitation or representation Catharsis – clarification Peripeteia – reversal Anagnorisis – identification Hamartia – miscalculation Mythos – plot Ethos – character Dianoia – theme Lexis – diction Melos – melody Opsis - spectacle

PART IEpic poetry, tragedy, comedy,

dithyrambic poetry, & instrumental music are all modes of imitation but they differ in medium, objects, & manner of imitation.

In arts, imitation is produced by rhythm, language, and/or harmony.

PART II

Men are depicted in imitation as either better than, worse than, or the same as they are in real life.

Comedy represents men as worse, tragedy as better.

PART III

Poets may narrate in 1st or 3rd person or present the characters as living and moving before us

Dramas are poetry representing action.

PART IV

Man’s 2 instincts that gave birth to poetry: instinct of imitation and instinct of harmony and rhythm.

Greater plots, stately diction and iambic measure were adopted.

PART V

Comedy imitates the ludicrous-some defect or ugliness which is not painful or destructive.

Comedy does not have as well known of a history as tragedy.

PART VI

Tragedy imitates action that is serious, complete & of certain magnitude in artistically embellished language.

The 6 parts of tragedy are plot, character, thought, diction, song, and spectacle, in that order of importance

PART VII

A plot must be whole and neither begin nor end in haphazard.

A plot must be great enough in magnitude to be beautiful but not so long that it cannot be remembered in one view.

PART VIII

The plot should imitate one action with structural union of the parts.

Incidents whose presence or absence makes no difference need not be included.

PART IX

Poetry relates not what has happened but what may happen according to the law of probability or necessity.

Poetry tends to express the universal, history in particular.

PART X

Plots are either simple or complex.

Complex plots have a change of fortune with a reversal of the situation.

PART XI

Reversal of the situation is when the action veers round to its opposite. Recognition, a change from ignorance to knowledge.

The plot includes a scene of suffering, a destructive or painful suffering.

PART XII

The parts of tragedy are: Prologue, Episode, Exode, and Choric song.

PART XIII

A perfect tragedy should be complex, have a single issue and excite pity of fear.

The change of fortune should be from good to bad due to error or frailty.

PART XIV

Superior plots arouse fear and pity by their inner structure rather than by spectacle and extraneous aids.

Tragic deeds can be done or not done, wittingly or unwittingly.

PART XV

Character should aim at goodness, propriety, trueness to life, and consistency.

The poet should follow the necessary or the probable limits.

PART XVI

Recognition comes about by signs, the will of the poet, memory when the sight of some object awakens a feeling by process of reasoning.

The last way is superior.

PART XVII

The poet should try to place the scene before his eyes as if he were a spectator of the action.

The poet should first sketch the general outline of the story then fill in the episodes in details.

PART XVIII

The 2 parts of a tragedy are the Complication w/c extends from the beginning to the turning point & Denouement which extends from the beginning of the change to the end.

The poet should not attempt to make an epic structure with multiple plots.

PART XIX

Thought includes every effect produced by speech such as proof ad refutation.

Thought also includes dramatic incidents that need no verbal exposition.

PART XX

The general parts of language are: Letter, Syllable, Connecting word, Noun, Verb, Sentence or phrase.

PART XXI

Simple words are composed of non-significant elements and compound words are composed of a significant and non-significant or multiple significant events.

Words are current, strange (foreign), metaphorical, ornamental, newly-coined, lengthened, contracted or altered.

PART XXII

Perfect style is clear without being mean. Style consisting wholly of metaphors is riddle; style consisting wholly of strange words is jargon.

PART XXIII

Narrative poetic imitation is single meter should have a plot constructed on dramatic principles with a single, whole and complete action.

PART XXIV

Epic poetry has the same kinds and parts as tragedy, but epic poetry is on a greater scale and uses heroic meter.

The poet should speak as himself as little as possible.

PART XXV

Poets imitate either things as they were or are, things as they are said or thought to be, or things as they ought to be.

Language usage should be examined carefully.

PART XXVI

Epic poetry is addressed to a cultivated audience and tragedy to an inferior public.

It includes music, spectacular effects, vividness in reading as well as in representation, pleasurable narrower limits & unity

Criticisms

One of the most powerful, perceptive and influential works of criticism in Western literary history, the Poetics has informed serious thinking about drama ever since.

One of his least talked about or popular works among his corpus.

Criticisms

It seemed to be full of “should’s” and the latter came across as though there is a single answer to every possible question, even about what makes poetry good.

Aristotle says that the exercise of any capacity brings pleasure.

Criticisms

Even art cannot escape Aristotle’s categorical dissection. Like an entomologist pulling apart the wings of a butterfly to see its beauty.

Aristotle approached poetry with the same scientific method with which he treats physics and biology.

Criticisms

Poetics is one of those books that makes you admire the author while you want to strangle him. This work is highly influential.

Here is a rudimentary tablet of knowledge by one of the greats. First off, we are still eager to explore poetics that are in this aged article so clearly defined.

Criticisms

The information in this novel will not only force the readers to look at the world differently, but it also educates them in the ways of storytelling.

Aristotle discusses the issues in craft involved in poetics or what is I like to think of a storytelling.

Criticisms

Although this is quite possibly a useful book, it was dry and boring, I don’t feel that I got much of it, though I’m sure if I went to reread it, I might find useful stuffs.

Poetics is to writers as what bedrock is to architects.

Criticisms

I won’t say this is the best book on literary theory I have read, but it may be the most straightforward.

The End

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