Poetics by Aristotle (reading rainbow books .TXT) 📕

probability or necessity, will admit of a change from bad fortune to

good, or from good fortune to bad.

Unity of plot does not, as some persons think, consist in the Unity of

the hero. For infinitely various are the incidents in one man’s life

which cannot be reduced to unity; and so, too, there are many actions of

one man out of which we cannot make one action. Hence, the error, as it

appears, of all poets who have composed a Heracleid, a Theseid, or other

poems of the kind. They imagine that as Heracles was one man, the story

of Heracles must also be a unity. But Homer, as in all else he is of

surpassing merit, here too—whether from art or natural genius—seems to

have happily discerned the truth. In composing the Odyssey he did not

include all the adventures of Odysseus—such as his wound on Parnassus,

or his feigned madness at the mustering of the host—incidents between

which there was no necessary or probable connection: but he made the

Odyssey, and likewise the Iliad, to centre round an action that in our

sense of the word is one. As therefore, in the other imitative arts, the

imitation is one when the object imitated is one, so the plot, being an

imitation of an action, must imitate one action and that a whole, the

structural union of the parts being such that, if any one of them is

displaced or removed, the whole will be disjointed and disturbed. For a

thing whose presence or absence makes no visible difference, is not an

organic part of the whole.

It is, moreover, evident from what has been said, that it is not the

function of the poet to relate what has happened, but what may happen,—

what is possible according to the law of probability or necessity. The

poet and the historian differ not by writing in verse or in prose. The

work of Herodotus might be put into verse, and it would still be a

species of history, with metre no less than without it. The true

difference is that one relates what has happened, the other what may

happen. Poetry, therefore, is a more philosophical and a higher thing

than history: for poetry tends to express the universal, history the

particular. By the universal, I mean how a person of a certain type will

on occasion speak or act, according to the law of probability or

necessity; and it is this universality at which poetry aims in the names

she attaches to the personages. The particular is—for example—what

Alcibiades did or suffered. In Comedy this is already apparent: for here

the poet first constructs the plot on the lines of probability, and then

inserts characteristic names;—unlike the lampooners who write about

particular individuals. But tragedians still keep to real names, the

reason being that what is possible is credible: what has not happened we

do not at once feel sure to be possible: but what has happened is

manifestly possible: otherwise it would not have happened. Still there

are even some tragedies in which there are only one or two well known

names, the rest being fictitious. In others, none are well known, as in

Agathon’s Antheus, where incidents and names alike are fictitious, and

yet they give none the less pleasure. We must not, therefore, at all

costs keep to the received legends, which are the usual subjects of

Tragedy. Indeed, it would be absurd to attempt it; for even subjects that

are known are known only to a few, and yet give pleasure to all. It

clearly follows that the poet or ‘maker’ should be the maker of plots

rather than of verses; since he is a poet because he imitates, and what

he imitates are actions. And even if he chances to take an historical

subject, he is none the less a poet; for there is no reason why some

events that have actually happened should not conform to the law of the

probable and possible, and in virtue of that quality in them he is their

poet or maker.

Of all plots and actions the epeisodic are the worst. I call a plot

‘epeisodic’ in which the episodes or acts succeed one another without

probable or necessary sequence. Bad poets compose such pieces by their

own fault, good poets, to please the players; for, as they write show

pieces for competition, they stretch the plot beyond its capacity, and

are often forced to break the natural continuity.

But again, Tragedy is an imitation not only of a complete action, but of

events inspiring fear or pity. Such an effect is best produced when the

events come on us by sunrise; and the effect is heightened when, at the

same time, they follow as cause and effect. The tragic wonder will thee

be greater than if they happened of themselves or by accident; for even

coincidences are most striking when they have an air of design. We may

instance the statue of Mitys at Argos, which fell upon his murderer while

he was a spectator at a festival, and killed him. Such events seem not to

be due to mere chance. Plots, therefore, constructed on these principles

are necessarily the best.

Plots are either Simple or Complex, for the actions in real life, of

which the plots are an imitation, obviously show a similar distinction.

An action which is one and continuous in the sense above defined, I call

Simple, when the change of fortune takes place without Reversal of the

Situation and without Recognition.

A Complex action is one in which the change is accompanied by such

Reversal, or by Recognition, or by both. These last should arise from the

internal structure of the plot, so that what follows should be the

necessary or probable result of the preceding action. It makes all the

difference whether any given event is a case of propter hoc or post hoc.

Reversal of the Situation is a change by which the action veers round to

its opposite, subject always to our rule of probability or necessity.

Thus in the Oedipus, the messenger comes to cheer Oedipus and free him

from his alarms about his mother, but by revealing who he is, he produces

the opposite effect. Again in the Lynceus, Lynceus is being led away to

his death, and Danaus goes with him, meaning, to slay him; but the

outcome of the preceding incidents is that Danaus is killed and Lynceus

saved. Recognition, as the name indicates, is a change from ignorance to

knowledge, producing love or hate between the persons destined by the

poet for good or bad fortune. The best form of recognition is coincident

with a Reversal of the Situation, as in the Oedipus. There are indeed

other forms. Even inanimate things of the most trivial kind may in a

sense be objects of recognition. Again, we may recognise or discover

whether a person has done a thing or not. But the recognition which is

most intimately connected with the plot and action is, as we have said,

the recognition of persons. This recognition, combined, with Reversal,

will produce either pity or fear; and actions producing these effects are

those which, by our definition, Tragedy represents. Moreover, it is upon

such situations that the issues of good or bad fortune will depend.

Recognition, then, being between persons, it may happen that one person

only is recognised by the other-when the latter is already known—or it

may be necessary that the recognition should be on both sides. Thus

Iphigenia is revealed to Orestes by the sending of the letter; but

another act of recognition is required to make Orestes known to

Iphigenia.

Two parts, then, of the Plot—Reversal of the Situation and Recognition—

turn upon surprises. A third part is the Scene of Suffering. The Scene of

Suffering is a destructive or painful action, such as death on the stage,

bodily agony, wounds and the like.

[The parts of Tragedy which must be treated as elements of the whole have

been already mentioned. We now come to the quantitative parts, and the

separate parts into which Tragedy is divided, namely, Prologue, Episode,

Exode, Choric song; this last being divided into Parode and Stasimon.

These are common to all plays: peculiar to some are the songs of actors

from the stage and the Commoi.

The Prologue is that entire part of a tragedy which precedes the Parode

of the Chorus. The Episode is that entire part of a tragedy which is

between complete choric songs. The Exode is that entire part of a tragedy

which has no choric song after it. Of the Choric part the Parode is the

first undivided utterance of the Chorus: the Stasimon is a Choric ode

without anapaests or trochaic tetrameters: the Commos is a joint

lamentation of Chorus and actors. The parts of Tragedy which must be

treated as elements of the whole have been already mentioned. The

quantitative parts the separate parts into which it is divided—are here

enumerated.]

As the sequel to what has already been said, we must proceed to consider

what the poet should aim at, and what he should avoid, in constructing

his plots; and by what means the specific effect of Tragedy will be

produced.

A perfect tragedy should, as we have seen, be arranged not on the simple

but on the complex plan. It should, moreover, imitate actions which

excite pity and fear, this being the distinctive mark of tragic

imitation. It follows plainly, in the first place, that the change, of

fortune presented must not be the spectacle of a virtuous man brought

from prosperity to adversity: for this moves neither pity nor fear; it

merely shocks us. Nor, again, that of a bad man passing from adversity to

prosperity: for nothing can be more alien to the spirit of Tragedy; it

possesses no single tragic quality; it neither satisfies the moral sense

nor calls forth pity or fear. Nor, again, should the downfall of the

utter villain be exhibited. A plot of this kind would, doubtless, satisfy

the moral sense, but it would inspire neither pity nor fear; for pity is

aroused by unmerited misfortune, fear by the misfortune of a man like

ourselves. Such an event, therefore, will be neither pitiful nor

terrible. There remains, then, the character between these two extremes,-

-that of a man who is not eminently good and just,-yet whose misfortune

is brought about not by vice or depravity, but by some error or frailty.

He must be one who is highly renowned and prosperous,—a personage like

Oedipus, Thyestes, or other illustrious men of such families.

A well constructed plot should, therefore, be single in its issue, rather

than double as some maintain. The change of fortune should be not from

bad to good, but, reversely, from good to bad. It should come about as

the result not of vice, but of some great error or frailty, in a

character either such as we have described, or better rather than worse.

The practice of the stage bears out our view. At first the poets

recounted any legend that came in their way. Now, the best tragedies are

founded on the story of a few houses, on the fortunes of Alcmaeon,

Oedipus, Orestes, Meleager, Thyestes, Telephus, and those others who have

done or suffered something terrible. A tragedy, then, to be perfect

according to the rules of art should be of this construction. Hence they

are in error who censure Euripides just because he follows this principle

in his plays, many of which end unhappily. It is, as we have said, the

right ending. The best proof is that on the stage and in dramatic

competition, such plays, if well worked out, are the most tragic in

effect; and