Poetics by Aristotle (reading rainbow books .TXT) 📕

perhaps employs {omicron upsilon rho eta alpha sigma} not in the sense of

mules, but of sentinels. So, again, of Dolon: ‘ill-favoured indeed he was

to look upon.’ It is not meant that his body was ill-shaped, but that his

face was ugly; for the Cretans use the word {epsilon upsilon epsilon iota

delta epsilon sigma}, ‘well-favoured,’ to denote a fair face. Again,

{zeta omega rho omicron tau epsilon rho omicron nu delta epsilon

kappa epsilon rho alpha iota epsilon}, ‘mix the drink livelier,’ does not

mean `mix it stronger’ as for hard drinkers, but ‘mix it quicker.’

Sometimes an expression is metaphorical, as ‘Now all gods and men were

sleeping through the night,’—while at the same time the poet says:

‘Often indeed as he turned his gaze to the Trojan plain, he marvelled at

the sound of flutes and pipes.’ ‘All’ is here used metaphorically for

‘many,’ all being a species of many. So in the verse,—‘alone she hath no

part . . ,’ {omicron iota eta}, ‘alone,’ is metaphorical; for the best

known may be called the only one.

Again, the solution may depend upon accent or breathing. Thus Hippias of

Thasos solved the difficulties in the lines,—{delta iota delta omicron

mu epsilon nu (delta iota delta omicron mu epsilon nu) delta epsilon /

omicron iota,} and { tau omicron mu epsilon nu omicron upsilon

(omicron upsilon) kappa alpha tau alpha pi upsilon theta epsilon tau

alpha iota / omicron mu beta rho omega}.

Or again, the question may be solved by punctuation, as in Empedocles,—

‘Of a sudden things became mortal that before had learnt to be immortal,

and things unmixed before mixed.’

Or again, by ambiguity of meaning,—as {pi alpha rho omega chi eta kappa

epsilon nu delta epsilon pi lambda epsilon omega / nu upsilon xi},

where the word {pi lambda epsilon omega} is ambiguous.

Or by the usage of language. Thus any mixed drink is called {omicron iota

nu omicron sigma}, ‘wine.’ Hence Ganymede is said ‘to pour the wine to

Zeus,’ though the gods do not drink wine. So too workers in iron are

called {chi alpha lambda kappa epsilon alpha sigma}, or workers in

bronze. This, however, may also be taken as a metaphor.

Again, when a word seems to involve some inconsistency of meaning, we

should consider how many senses it may bear in the particular passage.

For example: ‘there was stayed the spear of bronze’—we should ask in how

many ways we may take ‘being checked there.’ The true mode of

interpretation is the precise opposite of what Glaucon mentions. Critics,

he says, jump at certain groundless conclusions; they pass adverse

judgment and then proceed to reason on it; and, assuming that the poet

has said whatever they happen to think, find fault if a thing is

inconsistent with their own fancy. The question about Icarius has been

treated in this fashion. The critics imagine he was a Lacedaemonian. They

think it strange, therefore, that Telemachus should not have met him when

he went to Lacedaemon. But the Cephallenian story may perhaps be the true

one. They allege that Odysseus took a wife from among themselves, and

that her father was Icadius not Icarius. It is merely a mistake, then,

that gives plausibility to the objection.

In general, the impossible must be justified by reference to artistic

requirements, or to the higher reality, or to received opinion. With

respect to the requirements of art, a probable impossibility is to be

preferred to a thing improbable and yet possible. Again, it may be

impossible that there should be men such as Zeuxis painted. ‘Yes,’ we

say, ‘but the impossible is the higher thing; for the ideal type must

surpass the reality.’ To justify the irrational, we appeal to what is

commonly said to be. In addition to which, we urge that the irrational

sometimes does not violate reason; just as ‘it is probable that a thing

may happen contrary to probability.’

Things that sound contradictory should be examined by the same rules as

in dialectical refutation whether the same thing is meant, in the same

relation, and in the same sense. We should therefore solve the question

by reference to what the poet says himself, or to what is tacitly assumed

by a person of intelligence.

The element of the irrational, and, similarly, depravity of character,

are justly censured when there is no inner necessity for introducing

them. Such is the irrational element in the introduction of Aegeus by

Euripides and the badness of Menelaus in the Orestes.

Thus, there are five sources from which critical objections are drawn.

Things are censured either as impossible, or irrational, or morally

hurtful, or contradictory, or contrary to artistic correctness. The

answers should be sought under the twelve heads above mentioned.

The question may be raised whether the Epic or Tragic mode of imitation

is the higher. If the more refined art is the higher, and the more

refined in every case is that which appeals to the better sort of

audience, the art which imitates anything and everything is manifestly

most unrefined. The audience is supposed to be too dull to comprehend

unless something of their own is thrown in by the performers, who

therefore indulge in restless movements. Bad flute-players twist and

twirl, if they have to represent ‘the quoit-throw,’ or hustle the

coryphaeus when they perform the ‘Scylla.’ Tragedy, it is said, has this

same defect. We may compare the opinion that the older actors entertained

of their successors. Mynniscus used to call Callippides ‘ape’ on account

of the extravagance of his action, and the same view was held of

Pindarus. Tragic art, then, as a whole, stands to Epic in the same

relation as the younger to the elder actors. So we are told that Epic

poetry is addressed to a cultivated audience, who do not need gesture;

Tragedy, to an inferior public. Being then unrefined, it is evidently the

lower of the two.

Now, in the first place, this censure attaches not to the poetic but to

the histrionic art; for gesticulation may be equally overdone in epic

recitation, as by Sosi-stratus, or in lyrical competition, as by

Mnasitheus the Opuntian. Next, all action is not to be condemned any more

than all dancing—but only that of bad performers. Such was the fault

found in Callippides, as also in others of our own day, who are censured

for representing degraded women. Again, Tragedy like Epic poetry produces

its effect even without action; it reveals its power by mere reading. If,

then, in all other respects it is superior, this fault, we say, is not

inherent in it.

And superior it is, because it has all the epic elements—it may even use

the epic metre—with the music and spectacular effects as important

accessories; and these produce the most vivid of pleasures. Further, it

has vividness of impression in reading as well as in representation.

Moreover, the art attains its end within narrower limits; for the

concentrated effect is more pleasurable than one which is spread over a

long time and so diluted. What, for example, would be the effect of the

Oedipus of Sophocles, if it were cast into a form as long as the Iliad?

Once more, the Epic imitation has less unity; as is shown by this, that

any Epic poem will furnish subjects for several tragedies. Thus if the

story adopted by the poet has a strict unity, it must either be concisely

told and appear truncated; or, if it conform to the Epic canon of length,

it must seem weak and watery. <Such length implies some loss of unity,>

if, I mean, the poem is constructed out of several actions, like the

Iliad and the Odyssey, which have many such parts, each with a certain

magnitude of its own. Yet these poems are as perfect as possible in

structure; each is, in the highest degree attainable, an imitation of a

single action.

If, then, Tragedy is superior to Epic poetry in all these respects, and,

moreover, fulfils its specific function better as an art for each art

ought to produce, not any chance pleasure, but the pleasure proper to it,

as already stated it plainly follows that Tragedy is the higher art, as

attaining its end more perfectly.

Thus much may suffice concerning Tragic and Epic poetry in general;

their several kinds and parts, with the number of each and their

differences; the causes that make a poem good or bad; the objections of

the critics and the answers to these objections.

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