Expert: Maria - 10/3/2006

Question

   Aristotle's views on arts as an imitation of nature.
   I actually want to know how Aristotle views on different arts, like poetry, drama, tragedy,characterization, comedy.
   If you answer this question to me i will be very much thankful to you.
     
                    Yours faithfully
                     John A Sangma

Answer
Hello,

This literary question is  very broad,indeed!
Anyway I’ll try  to make a brief summary about Aristotle's views on art.

Unlike Plato who in his Republic expressed the condemnation of poetry in general as he said that art, and then poetry, tragedy and comedy,  were nothing but an imitation of an imitation and were therefore inferior, since  the world, i.e. nature,  was a shadow or image of the ‘real‘ world, Aristotle in his Poetics says that art, i.e. poetry,  is an imitation (mimesis) not of nature in its own, but  of the  fundamental expressions of our human experience so that poetry, and then tragedy and comedy, encourage emotions in the audience, and moreover teach us, since mimesis not only recreates existing objects or elements of nature, but also beautifies and universalizes them.

In short POETRY depicts things in their universal character and then represents people either as better or as worse than people usually are.

In fact while  COMEDY is the imitation of the worse examples of humanity, not however in the sense of absolute badness, but only into what is laughable and comic, TRAGEDY is the representation of a serious or meaningful action which excites fear and pity in the mind of the observer to purify or purge these feelings (‘katharsis’, in Greek, i.e. “a  purifying or figurative cleansing of the emotions, especially pity and fear, described by Aristotle as an effect of tragic drama on its audience”).

As for the characters, they are  of course one of the six principal elements  in the structure of tragedy, i.e 1) plot (Greek ‘mythos’2) character, 3)theme 4) diction, 5) song and 6) spectacle.

Moreover “tragedy ( and comedy) is not a representation of men but of a piece of action, of life, of happiness and unhappiness, which come under the head of action, and the end aimed at is the representation not of qualities of CHARACTER but of some action; and while character makes men what they are, it's their actions and experiences that make them happy or the opposite. They do not therefore act to represent character, but character-study is included for the sake of the action”.(See Poetics, 1450 a)

Finally note that Aristotle, who was the first to write a book on how to analyse plays,i.e. DRAMA, uses Sophocles’ Oedipus the King as a paradigm of a perfect tragedy and  says that
”tragedy is an imitation [Greek ‘mimesis’] of an action that is serious, complete and of a certain magnitude ...through pity and fear effecting the proper purgation  of these emotions."
In fact he thinks that this purification brings about spiritual renewal or release from tension.
[See below for some passages from Aristotle's Poetics].

Hope this outline can give you a first insight on this interesting matter.

Best regards,
Maria
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Poetics, 1449 b :
“TRAGEDY is, then, a representation of an action that is heroic and complete and of a certain magnitude--by means of language enriched with all kinds of ornament, each used separately in the different parts of the play: it represents men in action and does not use narrative, and through pity and fear it effects relief to these and similar emotions".

Poetics, 1450 a:
“Tragedy is not a representation of MEN but of a piece of action, of life, of happiness and unhappiness, which come under the head of action, and the end aimed at is the representation not of qualities of character but of some action; and while CHARACTER makes men what they are, it's their actions and experiences that make them happy or the opposite. They do not therefore act to represent character, but character-study is included for the sake of the action. It follows that the incidents and the plot are the end at which tragedy aims, and in everything the end aimed at is of prime importance. Moreover, you could not have a tragedy without action, but you can have one with out character-study”.

Poetics,1449 a: “COMEDY, as we have said, is a representation of inferior people, not indeed in the full sense of the word bad, but the laughable is a species of the base or ugly.It consists in some blunder or ugliness that does not cause pain or disaster, an obvious example being the comic mask which is ugly and distorted but not painful”.