Poetics

 Full Title: Poetics

 When Written: Unknown; likely between 335 and 323

B.C.E.

 Where Written: Athens, Greece

 When Published: Unknown; likely between 335 and 323

B.C.E.

 Literary Period: Classical Greek

 Genre: Literary Theory

 Point of View: First Person

 The importance of the Poetics lies in its foundational nature;

it established benchmarks for effective storytelling that still
shape narrative structures today. For instance, Aristotle's
deconstruction of plot structure into beginning,
middle, and end is still widely used in writing fiction
or non-fiction works today.

 Aristotle delves into the realm of poetry in his work

"Poetics," where he examines poetry in its broad and
specific contexts.

 He delves into its impact on its audience and the art of

crafting an effective poetic plot.

 Breaking down poetry into its constituent elements,

Aristotle addresses various inquiries that arise.
 He begins by asserting that poetry adheres strictly to
natural principles. (Aristotle starts with the principles of
poetry, which he says is only “natural.”)

 He enumerates the different types poetry: epic,

tragedy, comedy, dithyrambic poetry, and music by
pipe or lyre.

 Additionally, he claims that all poetry is a form of

imitation that only differs in three ways: its medium,
its object, and/or its mode of imitation.

 The medium of imitation depends on the kind of art

(a painter or a sculptor uses colour or shape as a medium),
whereas a poet uses the medium of rhythm, language,
and melody—each of which can be used alone or together
to create some desired effect.

 The object is the thing that is imitated in a work of

art—in this case, in a poem. Objects, which include people,
things, and events, can be either admirable or inferior,
meaning that objects are either morally good or morally
bad.

 Lastly, an object’s mode of imitation is the way in

which an object is imitated. In epic poetry, an object is
imitated through narration; however, in tragedy, an
object is imitated via actors on a stage.

 Aristotle argues that human beings have a natural

liking for imitation, and since humans learn lessons
through imitation from a young age, he maintains that
people have a strong tendency to imitate people and
things.

 Furthermore, people take pleasure in viewing distressing

images from a safe distance, such as a stage. The
pleasure people feel in viewing an imitation is in
 large part due to understanding. A person views an
imitation, recognizes the thing being imitated, and finds
pleasure in this understanding.

 Aristotle further argues that human begins also have a

natural liking for rhythm and melody, so it is no wonder
they tend to create imitations like poetry, which relies
on language that has both rhythm and melody.

 Tragedy was born from dithyrambic poetry, which

incorporates both poetry and dance. From there,
tragedy evolved into what it is in Aristotle’s time—which
he refers to as tragedy’s “natural state.”

 Comedy imitates inferior people, Aristotle claims, but

such characters are not inferior in every way.

 Characters in comedy are guilty of “laughable

errors”; however, such errors do not elicit painful
emotions in the audience.

 A comedy does not imitate pain, and it should not

provoke these emotions in others.

 Conversely, tragedy and epic poetry imitate admirable

people, but epic uses only verse and is in narrative
form.

 Plainly put, an epic does not involve song, and it is

usually told through the lens of a single character
narration.

 Epics are usually long, whereas a tragedy is often

restricted to the events of a single day.

 Those who have a firm understanding of tragedy will

also have a firm understanding of epic, as everything
present is epic is also present in tragedy.
 However, all that is present in a tragedy cannot be
found in an epic poem.

 A tragedy is an imitation of an admirable action that

has unity and magnitude.

 Tragedy is written in language that has rhythm and

melody, and it is performed by actors, not by
narration.

 Most importantly, tragedy purifies the audience by

producing in them the emotions of fear and pity in a
process known as catharsis.

 A tragedy has six components—plot, character, diction,

reasoning, spectacle, and lyric poetry—and these
components determine a tragedy’s quality.

 Plot, however, is the most important component part of

tragedy. Tragedy imitates actions, not people, and
these actions are the events that make up the plot.

 Plus, the most effective way in which a tragedy

produces catharsis is through recognition and
reversal, which are both part of the plot.

 A tragedy must be “whole,” and it must have a

definite beginning, middle, and end.

 A tragedy must have magnitude, meaning it must

produce astonishment in the audience, but its
imitation cannot be arbitrary (random).

 If the action being imitated in a tragedy is too big or

too small, the entire plot cannot be appreciated at
once, and unity is forfeited.
 An imitation has unity if it represents a complete
action, and the same goes for plot—a plot is only
unified if it imitates a complete action.

 Poetry does not imitate “what has happened,”

Aristotle argues, it imitates “what would happen,” as
long as it is probable or necessary.

 Historians and poets are not different because one

writes in prose and one in verse; they are different
because the former writes what has happened, while
the latter writes what would happen.

 Even if all historian wrote in poetic verse, their

writing would still not be considered poetry.

 It is a poet’s job to make plots, and those plots can

include the sort of thing that has happened, since the
sort of thing that has happened is likely to happen
again.

 It is not enough for a tragedy to simply imitate a

whole action—the imitation must also provoke in the
audience the emotions needed for catharsis, and
catharsis is most effectively produced through
events that are unexpected.

 Every tragic plot involves a change of fortune, and

such plots can be either complex (in which a change of
fortune involves recognition, reversal, or both) or simple (in
which a change of fortune does not involve recognition or
reversal).

 A reversal “is a change to the opposite in the actions being

performed,” which, of course, occurs because of “necessity
or probability”—that is, in a way that seems likely and
that follows logically from the story’s previous
events.
 Recognition “is a change from ignorance to knowledge,
disclosing either a close relationship or enmity, on the part
of the people marked out for good or bad fortune.”

 The best plot, according to Aristotle, is one in which

recognition and reversal occur at the same time, as
they do in Sophocles’s Oedipus Rex.

 Recognition combined with reversal involves fear and

pity, which are the very foundation of tragedy, and
either good fortune or bad fortune will be the
outcome of such a combination.

 Tragedies that involve human suffering, such as in war,

are also effective in bringing about catharsis.

 The best tragedies, according to Aristotle, are those

with complex plots.

 A good tragedy should not depict an overly moral

character undergoing a change in fortune from good
to bad, as this upsets audiences and does not inspire
fear and pity. Similarly, an overly wicked character
should not undergo a change of fortune from bad to
good, as such a change isn’t tragic and will not
inspire fear or pity either.

 Still, a good tragedy does include a change in fortune

from good to bad, as such plots are more tragic than
plots that end in good fortune and will therefore elicit
more fear and pity.

 Tragedy includes acts that are “terrible or pitiable,”

and these acts can occur between people of a close
relationship (like family members), between enemies, or
between neutrals.
 There is maximum fear and pity in “terrible or
pitiable acts” between close characters, such as the
murder of one’s father or son.

 Aristotle next considers characters within tragedy: he

defines four things that go into the construction of a
character.

 The first is goodness, or the moral essence of a

character’s actions and disposition. A character’s imitation
must also be appropriate, and it must have likeness, or
similarity.

 Lastly, a character must be consistent, and if it is

necessary or probable that a character behave in an
inconsistent way, they should be “consistently
inconsistent.”

 Poets should always visualize a plot as they

construct it so that they can spot inconsistencies and
inappropriateness.

 A tragedy must also have complication and

resolution, and both complication and resolution
should be constructed with equal care and attention.

 A tragedy includes reasoning and diction, which can be

broken down further into several of its own component
parts, including nouns, verbs, and utterances.

 Clarity is most important in diction, as long as there

isn’t “loss of dignity.”

 Clear diction includes standard words in common

usage; however, using only common words in a poem
is unoriginal and inartistic and leads to a “loss of
dignity.”
 Thus, a balance must be struck between standard
words in common usage and “exotic expressions,”
which are coined by the poet or are otherwise non-standard.

 Good poetry uses all forms of diction, especially

metaphor and uncommon words.

 According to Aristotle, objections to poetry usually

involve one of the following: a poem is impossible,
irrational, harmful, contradictory, or incorrect.

 Often, that which seems impossible or irrational isn’t

as impossible as it may seem, especially since it is
paradoxically likely for unlikely things to happen.

 Furthermore, that which seems contradictory or

incorrect might be an imitation of an object as it
should be or as it is thought to be, not as it actually
is.

 In other words, Aristotle easily dismisses each of the

usual objections to poetry.

 People might ask if tragedy is superior to epic, and

Aristotle maintains that tragedy is absolutely
superior.

 An epic poem lacks spectacle and lyric poetry, which

are a “source of intense pleasure,” and a tragedy is
shorter.

 Aristotle argues that “what is more concentrated is more

pleasant than what is watered down by being extended in
time.”

 For instance, if Sophocles’s Oedipus Rex were as long as

Homer’s Iliad, it would be much less impactful.
 Lastly, since an epic is so much longer than a tragedy,
unity in an epic can be difficult to achieve.

 Because of this, Aristotle considers tragedy superior;

howev

 er, he argues that it is fear and pity, and the

subsequent catharsis, that really make tragedy
superior to epic poetry.

Johnson’s Preface to Shakespeare

 "Preface to Shakespeare" is a critical statement by Samuel

Johnson regarding Shakespeare and writing in general.

 The preface was published in 1765 and is an important

contribution to English literary criticism.

 Johnson edited and annotated the text and wrote a preface,

which is his greatest work of literary criticism.

 The preface has two sections: one dealing with Johnson’s

critical analysis of Shakespeare as a dramatist, and the
other part dealing with an explication of the editorial
methods used by Johnson in his Edition of Shakespeare.

 In the preface, which begins Johnson’s 1765 edition of

Shakespeare’s collected works, Johnson considers why
Shakespeare has stood the test of time.

 In accounting for this timeless quality, Johnson states that

Shakespeare 's virtue is that he accurately conveys
human nature, action, and speech—in short, that he
holds up a mirror to mankind.
 Johnson also dismisses as irrelevant those critics who have
criticized Shakespeare’s breaking of the “unities” of time
and place.

Wordworth’s Preface to Lyrical Ballads

 Full Title: Preface to the Lyrical Ballads

 When Written: 1800-1802

 Where Written: Grasmere, England

 When Published: 1800 (2nd ed.), 1802 (3rd ed.)

 Literary Period: Romantic

 Genre: Essay, Manifesto

 Antagonist: Late-Neoclassical writers

 Point of View: First Person

 Preface to Lyrical Ballads summary & analysis : Thinking Literature

 T.S. Eliot’s Metaphysical Poets

Certainly! Here are some subtopics for presentations based on the list you’ve provided:

 Aristotle: The Poetics

o The concept of mimesis (imitation)
o Aristotle’s definition of tragedy
o Catharsis in Greek drama
 Johnson’s “Preface to Shakespeare”
o The nature of Shakespeare’s genius
o Johnson’s views on poetic justice
o The role of the critic according to Johnson
 S.N. Dasgupta: ‘Theory of Rasa’
o The eight Rasas and their significance
o Emotional responses in Indian aesthetics
o Rasa as an aesthetic experience
 S.K. Dey: ‘Kuntaka’s Theory of Poetry: Vakrokti’
o Vakrokti as a stylistic device
o The role of creativity in Kuntaka’s theory
o Comparison of Vakrokti with other poetic theories
 William Wordsworth: Preface to Lyrical Ballads
o Wordsworth’s views on poetry and nature
o The concept of the ‘ordinary’ in poetry
o The role of emotion and imagination
 Matthew Arnold: The Study of Poetry
o Arnold’s criteria for evaluating poetry
o The function of poetry according to Arnold
o Poetry as a criticism of life
 T.S. Eliot’s “Metaphysical Poets”; “Tradition and Individual Talent”
o The unification of sensibility in Metaphysical poets
o Eliot’s concept of the ‘impersonal’ poet
o The historical sense in “Tradition and Individual Talent”
 Cleanth Brooks: ‘Language of Paradox’
o The paradox as a tool in poetry
 o Analysis of irony and contradiction
o Brooks’ contribution to New Criticism
 Raymond Williams: “Base and Superstructure in Marxist Cultural Theory”
o The relationship between culture and society
o The concept of cultural materialism
o Williams’ critique of classical Marxism
 Harold Bloom: The Study of Poetry
o Bloom’s theory of poetic influence
o The anxiety of influence among poets
o The concept of misreading as a poetic principle
 Elaine Showalter: ‘Introduction’ in A Literature of Their Own
o The female literary tradition
o The phases of women’s writing
o Showalter’s feminist critique
 Juliet Mitchell: ‘Feminity, Narrative and Psychoanalysis’
o The intersection of psychoanalysis and feminism
o Narrative structure and gender identity
o Mitchell’s analysis of femininity in literature
 Michele Barrett: ‘Ideology and the Cultural Production of Gender’
o The social construction of gender
o Ideology’s role in gender relations
o Barrett’s Marxist feminist perspective
 Frantz Fanon: Excerpts from Black Skin, White Masks
o The psychology of colonization
o Fanon’s views on race and identity
o The impact of language on the colonized
 Gauri Viswanathan: ‘The Beginnings of English Literary Study in British India’
o The role of English literature in colonial education
o The cultural implications of teaching English literature
o Viswanathan’s analysis of literary study as a colonial tool
 Practical Criticism Rhetoric & Prosody
o The practice of close reading
o Rhetorical devices in poetry
o The importance of meter and sound in verse

These subtopics can serve as a starting point for a more detailed exploration in your presentation. Good
luck! 📚