Poetics - Aristotle (fun to read TXT) 📗
- Author: Aristotle
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probability or necessity, will admit of a change from bad fortune to
good, or from good fortune to bad.
VIIIUnity 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.
IXIt 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.
XPlots 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.
XIReversal 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.
XII[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.]
XIIIAs 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
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