Aristotle
- The Poetics
Difference Between
Tragedy and Epic
In its form the epic is different from
tragedy. It imitates life by narration and not by dramatic action and speech,
and it has much greater length than tragedy. It has no use for song and
spectacle which form part of action. It communicates its meaning in mere
reading or recitation. In its length it is not restricted like the tragedy,
where everything happening everywhere cannot be shown for the simple reason
that the stage represents but one place and so can admit but one set of
characters, i.e., those connected with an event at that place only. But in epic
poetry, owing to the narrative form, many events simultaneously transacted can
be presented and these, if relevant to the subject, add mass and dignity to the
poem. The epic has an advantage of diverting the mind of the hearer and
relieving the story with varying episodes. For sameness of incident soon produces
satiety and makes tragedies fail on the stage. But the narration gains in
effect if the poet himself speaks as little as possible and leaves all to be
explained by his characters in the dramatic manner.
Moral
Goodness of the Heroic Order
According
to Aristotle, the characters portrayed in epic and tragic poetry have their basis
in moral goodness; but the goodness is of the heroic order. It is quite
distinct from plain virtue. It has nothing in it common or mean. Whatever be
the moral imperfections in the characters, they are such as impress our
imagination and arouse the sense of grandeur: we are lifted above the reality
of daily life.
Use
of Improbable
A
third difference between epic and tragedy is in the use of improbable or the
marvelous. Poets are tempted to use it because it is pleasing. But there is
greater scope for it in the epic, where it is perceived only by the imagination
than tragedy where it is perceived by the eye. Invisible to the eye in the
epic, its improbability passes unnoticed, but visibly seen on the stage, it
appears absurd. Hence Aristotle’s observation that ‘the poet should prefer
probable impossibilities to improbable possibilities’, i.e., the believable
false to the unbelievable true-a convincing lie to an unconvincing fact. Such
use of supernatural alone is artistic and the more so in the epic than in
tragedy.
Tragedy
is Superior to Epic
To
the question whether the epic or the tragic mode of imitation is the higher,
Aristotle’s
answer
is – the tragic mode. The claims of the epic mode to superiority over the
tragic are that it appeals to a more refined audience; it achieves its effect
without theatrical aid and that its action is more varied. Aristotle concludes that
tragedy is the superior of the two. For it also appeals to a cultivated audience
when merely read and unfolds its action within narrower limits. Even its
performance in the theater conduces to greater pleasure; while its limited
length, attaining greater unity, works no less to the same end, ‘for the
concentrated effect is more pleasurable than one which is spread over a long
time and so diluted’. Tragedy therefore attains its end more perfectly than the
epic.
Views
on Style
Aristotle
lays down two essentials of good writing-clearness and prosperity. The object
of writing being to communicate the writer’s meaning, it has, first, to be
clear or intelligent, but as the meanings to be conveyed are different at
different times, the same mode of writing may not be proper for them all. What
is therefore needed, next, is the propriety or suitability of each mode of
writing to the meaning it is intended to convey. For intelligibility current
words are the best, for they are familiar to all, but writing being an art, it
should aim at dignity and charm also. These are best attained by the use of
unfamiliar words-archaic words, foreign words, dialect words, newly-coined
words- that have an element of surprise and novelty in them. For the same
reason the metaphysical use of words, conveying a hidden resemblance between
things apparently dissimilar, is to be preferred to the plain. It partakes both
of the familiar and the unfamiliar. It looks like familiar because ‘all men in
their ordinary speech make use of metaphors’ and unfamiliar because it often
discerns resemblances of surprising nature. A perfect poetic style uses words
of all kinds in a judicious combination. All the same, compound words are best
suited to the lyric which strives after ornament, rare or unfamiliar words to
the epic which needs to be stately in expression, and metaphorical language to
the drama which keeps as close as possible to everyday speech.
Charm
of Style- The Use of Metaphor
Poetics
and Rhetoric follow more or less the same line, but Rhetoric is further remarkable
for its comments on composition in prose and style in general. ‘The style of
prose is distant from that of poetry’, for whereas poetry largely draws upon
unfamiliar words to attain dignity and charm, prose, dealing with everyday
subjects, can use only familiar or current words. One source of charm is common
to both-the use of metaphor. By employing it judiciously prose can also introduce
an element of novelty and surprise in its otherwise plain statements. In the
arrangements of words into sentence, it should avoid multiplicity of clauses,
parenthesis and ambiguous punctuation. Words can be arranged into two kinds of
style –loose or periodic. The loose style is made up of a series of sentences,
held together by connective words. In the periodic style each sentence is a
complete whole with a beginning, an end and a length, that can be comprehended
at a glance. Each such sentence may form part of a bigger whole if the sense so
requires it. While the loose style is formless, being just a chain of sentences
that may be increased or reduced at will, the periodic style has a form that
cannot be so easily tampered with. The loose style therefore is less
intelligent than the periodic and also less graceful. The one just runs on, and
the other follows a measured course that imparts to it the charm of poetry.
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