Aristotle: The Theory of Art

 Mimesis= Plato used it in a very narrow sense which is servile

 Aristotle differs as he says art is an imitation of what is or has been but
what might be
 Art has high seriousness and truth because it is no more philosophical
(History and science)
Form vs matter and real vs. ideal (It is done)
The artist believes in form because he has a vision which he colours it in any
shape
 The artist tries to give us what the nature fails to do so. The artist tries
to imagine what is ideal
 Artist imposes order in the chaos of this world by removing all chances
and incidents and relates everything casually. (What ought to be)
FINE ARTS VS. USEFUL ART
Fine art includes painting, dancing, music and literature whereas useful art
includes architecture, handicraft etc.
 Art has its own end (no religion and politics bondage)
 Art is the imitation of nature 2. Art is the imitation of man in action
 Nature is a later development not of Greece
 The only important thing was man not nature it was in the background
 When art imitates the nature it is the useful art not the fine art (to
produce perfect people)
 In applying the method of nature the artist tries to remove these
imperfections
 The example of doctor when he tries to imitate the nature and cure man
 Perfect beautiful woman=plastic surgeon
THREE OBJECTS OF IMITATION
Three objects of imitation of an artist
1. Character 2. Emotion 3. Action
CHARACTER
He means only the moral qualities of man by character. This is the permanent
disposition of mind.
Man of good character and his response. So character and thought make full
man
2. Emotion= the temporary mood or feeling. It is for a short interval of
time
3. Action= the artist imitation is action which does not mean external
action. What goes on within man’s life internally
 Man is not a machine so there is something which makes a person
think and act
 The internal action precedes the external action
 Images in poetry they are not symbolic, the unrealized world has
resemblance to symbols
 The unrealized world resembles the body of art which is
appropriate
 History imitates particular and art the general so art is more
philosophical than history
IMAGINATION
Sensation= sense perception of a child to see the images to recall the past
Imagination is the faculty of recalling which is not creative
Conception= higher than sensation is conception which means going beyond
the particular to see the ideas of the thing. It is a process of reason.
Imagination discovers common and conception goes for beyond
 In poetical creation both collaborate because imagination gives a visible
property to invisible

THE END+ FUNCTION OF ART

 In the beginning art was considered for moral function

 Aristophenes in his work “The Frog” that the function of poetry is to
give moral and sound counsel. (Small boys have a school master and
when they grow up poets are their teachers)
 He also criticized Euripides on moral grounds because he mocked gods
and goddesses
 Roman Poet Horace “Art instructs and delights”
 Delightful instruction not like Mullah
 Mullah instruction is monotonous and boring it was 1800 years back
 Aristotle says that art has different function due to its nature and it
should be different from ethics and morality
 The end of art is to give necessary thing of life
 Its function is to furnish moral and mental resources
 The main function is pleasure (fine and useful art may not be)
 Higher Pleasure and Lower pleasure
 Comedy gives a lower pleasure for internal rest and relief
 The higher pleasure is from tragedy because it brings out the welfare
and reason for tragedy (Aristotle stands alone)
 Aristophenes praises Sophocles and condemns Euripides but he does it
on moral grounds. Aristophene did not believe in god. Aristotle also
praises Sophocles and criticizes Euripedes not on moral grounds but on
aesthetic grounds

POETRY
 Poetry is known once art is brought into context
 Music is the purest one because it imitates the character and emotions
directly
 It follows the movement of the soul
 Rhythm and melody
 Imitation
 A) Painter does not imitate emotion but it is the expression of emotions
(Colour and form)
 B) Dancer imitates the character and emotion of man. He imitates
through movement and gestures
 C) poet also does it but it is through words and symbols
 Metrical composition doesn’t make poetry but it makes it proper
 M, Poetry is the imitation of man in action by means of rhythm, melody
and words.
Classification of Poetry
Two objects of poetry
 Serious aspect of man which is the better aspect of man but not on
moral but heroic sense.
 Some are non-serious and they seem ridiculous with their common
follies and faults
 Two main classes are subdivided on the basis of manner
 Dialogue or narrative manner. The manner is serious then the dialogue
will be tragedy and the writer tragic writer. If it is the mixture we ll
have serious epic
 Non serious side will be comedy and the mixture will be comic epic and
the writer will be comic epic writer
Drama= the imitation of man by means of dialogues as its manner.
Epic= imitation of man in action by means of dialogues and narration
Tragedy= the imitation of serious aspects of man
The birth of poetry
 Demand of human nature not the history like religion, politics
 Aristotle also favours the natural view
 REASONS FOR THE BIRTH OF POETRY
 The urge of imitation in humans is inborn. Man is the most imitative
animal
 Painting a painful thing, or ugly thing also gives pleasure to humans
 3rd. It adds to our understanding (Wordsworth concept of common
man)
 Final: Harmony, melody and rhythm are sources of pleasure like a child
dances when he hears a song
GROWTH AND DEVELOPMENT OF POETRY
 Poetry is not created but born; the writer gives birth like a mother
 Poetry has infancy, growth, youth, maturity and decline
 In the past, there were two classification like they wrote, hymns to gods
and panegyrics like hamd and naat. (Serious)
  Non serious was ( Invectives and lampoons)
 In youth when the child grows there comes epic.. comic epic for non
serious
 Homer in Greece wrote both serious and non serious
 Like odyssey is serious and margites is non serious
 Drama is the perfect form of poetry… here also serious and non serious
aspects ( last stage of development)
 Drama is more serious and higher than poetry because youth is more
superior to childhood
THEORY OF TRAGEDY
Tragedy is the imitation of an action that is serious, complete and of a certain
magnitude; in language embellished with each kind of artistic ornament, the
several kinds being found in separate parts of the play; in the form of action,
not of narrative; through pity and fear effecting the proper catharsis of these
emotions.
 Imitation….. Action= Character+emotion
 Two means of imitation
1. Song or melody 2. Diction means metrical arrangement of words
2. One manner of imitation= Spectacle, show, masks etc
Serious means serious action no destruction and death (possibly)
Magnitude= Neither too long nor too short, proportionate.. small and long are
not appreciated
Complete= beginning, middle and end
Organic Unity= no part should be separated from it. Nothing can be added
nor deleted. This unity is possible only if the law of probability is obeyed.
Aristotle doesn’t like the possibility which is not probable. He likes probable
impossibility instead.
“Plausible impossibility is prefereable to an implausible possiblility”.
Superman can fly (in story it is write).. lottery in street ( it seems fake)
Function= pity and fear which is catharsis of emotions
Pity and fear are in three cases
Case 1= absolutely good, case 2= completely bad 3= ideal having hamartia
Catharsis= Moral interpretation= purification which arouses pity and fear
Plot is necessary for tragedy
Tragedy is the imitation of action not of person, the end is not of a person but
of action. Character is just means the end is plot.
 Play is possible without character not without plot
 By character he means the moral aspect of man
 No action so no play and no drama
 Yes without character there ll be no great play
 Pencil without colour but it is a painting though not good
 But colours on the canvas without design is like a play without action
 Third argument is; discovery and reversal like Oedipus rex has
discoveries and reversal.
 4th argument, inexperienced person can succeed in drawing characters
but not plot i.e Henery Fieldings has Parson Adam greatest character
but having no plot
 A plot should have nothing superfluous and nothing wanting like joseph
Andrews fieldings has good characters but loose plot.
 Tom jones has the greatest plot even if we take back one incident the
plot will break down.
 Dickens have not good plot and good characters are there. He creates a
cheap plot. He even in his first novel Pickwick papers did not create a
plot.
 Plot is the soul (vital principle of life) of tragedy
 Play is an organism in which the plot is a soul which is the vital
principle i.e seed is a living matter
 We sow it, it absorbs the non living matter and converts it to living.
 i.e meat is non living and when we eat it it is with living organism which
has the quality to perform this action
 plot makes these things together without it will be scattered
 soul is nucleus because of which things exisit
 Disagreement with Aristotle= they gave more importance to man rather
than plot.. they worshiped Shakespeare because of importance of
characters
  De Quincy a friend of Charles Lamb criticized him.. the reason is
misleading because Greeks believed in Destiny.
 This is full of misconceptions, man’s fate is predetermined or pre
written.. what is going to happen to him if written so all the things of the
life are meaningless and having no significance.
 Believing in destiny will make us puppets in hands of fate, Man, human
will, character.. all these sink into insignificance.
 The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ, moves on:
Nor all thy Piety nor Wit
Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line,
Nor all thy Tears wash out a Word of it.” (Umar Khayyam) whatever is done cannot be undone
 Man is not responsible for bad acts he does.
 “if your face is blackened with sin, you are not to ask His forgiveness
but He should ask your forgiveness”.
 Greeks did not believe in this kind of fate they had humanism which is
the faith in man
 Aristotle brought God to the level of an ordinary man
 Odedipus story of seers and slaying the father
 It was not from God
 Nemesis comes when the will of God is broken. God has not written the
fate but man has written his fate. If you escape the consequences your
children will face it. (Greeks believed in this)
 The writer of destiny is man not god. The action proceeds not from god
but from man himself.
 Oedipus is paid for what his father has done
 Aeschylus says that the son is not automatically punished. The penalty
lies asleep but when the son also does something sinful the sleeping
punishment awakens and falls upon the son
 Drama is not only complete but is a conflict internal or external

Simple plot and complex plot (Mythos)

 Simple plot is that one in which there is no discovery and reversal
 Complex has both
 Discovery means gaining knowledge of truth… Anagnorisis, refers to a
discovery or recognition, usually by the tragic hero, of some important truth about
themselves, their situation, or the world around them.
 Reversal means change of state.. Peripeteia refers to a sudden reversal
of fortune or changes in circumstances, often from good to bad or vice
versa. Six levels of recognition
 Discovery through external signs (recognition).. it may be congenital e.g
Birth mark or through accidents. Mark can lead to the discovery of a
person
 Odysseus entering home… wife was asked to marry… he went as a
beggar.. washing feet of beggar.. scar on foot.. discovery by external
means…truth pierces through deception.
 Discovery through memory (.. shipwreck.. the body of odysseus who was
still alive was floating to the shore.. to remember past…
 3. Through argument= Iphigenia by Euripedes. Ready to sacrifice a
stranger (her own brother).. syllogism
 Probability= Oedipus rex
 Senses/perception
 By inference
 Lusis is the resolution or denoument of plot
 Desis is the knot or complication before climax or peak

TRAGIC HERO
 Goodness= the words and actions reveal good purpose behind
everything
 Entirely bad person has no place in tragedy…
 Appropriateness= the character should be true to their particular
age, profession, class, sex or status.. like bravery with woman is not
appropriate
 Likeness= it means original but not very clear.. true to life
 Consistence= behave uniformly from the beginning to the end
 Should not be perfectly good.. not perfectly bad… it should be
intermediate
 He should have hamartia or error of judgement
 Three ways of Hamartia
 1. Ignorance of circumstances
 2. Error of judgement due to hasty or carless view of a given
situation
 3. The error is committed not deliberately
 Greek tragic hero vs. modern
Shaw, eliot said it can be saints… Shakespeare shows in Othello that
villain can also be a tragic hero…

LONGINUS (ON THE SUBLIME)

It is much easier to be lonely without someone…
Than it is to be lonely with somone (portia nelson)
Greek Hypsos=sublimity
  Sublimity is a certain elevation or distinction of expression or style
 Because of this great poets are immortal (misleading bcz it is leading
to manner not to matter)
 Both are necessary, it is not only manner but the matter as well…
matter of pope(cutting of lock)
 Why longinus calls for manner because literature is expression
The Effects of Sublimity
 Function of literature according to Aristotle and others
 Longinus says that it is not only to instruct and delight rather to fill the
reader with ecstasy and to cast a spell over him.
 The effect of sublime literature is irresistible
 It comes like a whirlwind and sweeps us off our feet
 It reaches the heart before reason.. like a magician casts spell and the
head is no more ours
 Sublime is with one stroke and the instructed one is slowly and
gradually
 It is like a flash of lightening like a thunder bolt.. we see affinity between
this point and mysticism… a supreme mystic is to come to oneness like
Emily bronte..
 There is question
 Can there be art of the sublime?
 One view is that it is by nature because poet is born not made
 The second view is; literature is the product of art not of nature.. he
must know the rules… hellinistic writers
 Longinus take the middle part he says that a sublime work is the combo
of both art and nature.
 Nature is innate , no one can become a poet without this…
 To know the laws we need art
 Longinus says if the spur is necessary so the curb is also necessary
 The spur is nature and the curb is art
 Water and bubbles of water need control
Tests of the Sublime/Sublimit
 There are four criteria of a work to be sublime
 1. Freshness= new and fresh, it never becomes stale, the wonder
never ceases like shakepeare who was far ahead of his time
  The ocean keeps many pearls beneath its surface which can never be
exhausted
 The deeper we go the more wonder we create/discover
 2. Suggestiveness= matter for reflection, it starts the chain of
thoughts and ideas in the reader
 3. Timelessness= it remains inspiring and moving for all… we know
nothing can survive the ravages of time but…
 Time is helpless before a thing of wonder
 4. Emotional appeal= to fill us with ecstasy
The Sources of the Sublime
There are five sources of the sublime according to Longinus
1. The power of forming grand conception.. it’s not in the sense of
imagination like Coleridge and wordsworth
 Imagination takes us to the life of reality it reveals the truth which is
beyond our normal consciousness. So every writer must have deep
and piercing imagination.
 We live in the world of shadows which should be removed through
the faculty of grand conception
 Man is the center and failure of man…
 Man’s place in universe to discover the wonders of existence.
 To go deeper into reality which revals the strong emotions and
passions
 Every experience implies duality the knower and the known
 In this stage, this distinction is wiped out
 The duality changes into absolute unity
 Poet is a mystic like he goes to oneness to other universe
 Flower of wordsworth and songs of birds
 Sublimity is the echo of a great soul… the poet is great morally and
psychologically that he sees great things.
 Psychologically, a poet must have a powerful personality
 Deep and genuine sympathy without which there can be no
understanding of man
 Great vision, thought and deep sympathy
 He must have moral greatness.. 1. a man should keep himself above
the temptations of senses
 2. He should not have extravagant attachement to money.. money
will make you morally weak…
 How can this grand conception be made effective…
 1. A writer should go to the essence of things.. to separate the
essential from non-essential things and then combine the essential to
an organic whole.
 Example of Sappho’s poem who was Greek and wrote about love.
She knows about love she separates and then organizes the essential
to organic whole.
 Longinus says about this poem as; love is a passion which affects all
the sights of man, of the lover. We can see in the eyes in the
manner… it affects all the senses.. it affects the mind and the soul..
 Burning and shivering, freezing at one and the other moment
 Fluent vs dumb
 Sharp mind vs. dull mind
 These are the contradictions of mind and soul
 2. Second method is amplification…bringing all the aspects together
and then arrange them in ascending order.. every succeeding stage
being higher than the preceding stage.. higher in thoughts
 He compares two oraters… Demosthenes and Cicero
 Cicero was Roman and a lawyer who gave hot speeches during
Pompey and Caesar a civil war.
 Demosthene had very little education or no education at all. Greek
and had his own cause-freedom. He had to speak for his cause.. he
stammered, weak lungs, no strong voice
 The greeks were imaginative and the Romans were practical.. he
compared two civilizations
 Cicero is compared to forest fire… and demosthenes to flash of
lightening and thunderbolt. The audience had no choice to resist but
were swept away.. to ignite fire to leaves and it spreads but slowly
and gradually
 3rd method is imitation… by imitation he means imbibing the spirit of
the great writers of the past. It is not the matter of study but a matter
of love.
 Example of Appolo.. there were prophetesses or oracles of applo.
 The center of applo had crack and a gas and the prophetesses would
inhale that gas for getting frenzied .. the writer is also like this…
 How to test the greatness of a work?
Test no 1; to know that we are writing in the spirit of Homer. The
greatness of our work.
Test no 2: you are reading your poem and imagine that Homer is
reading it.
Test 3: Universality is the other test
Test 4: Imagination
2nd source is intense passion and emotions
 Passion is the powerful emotion in poetry
 This passion brings a jealousy within a writer to do something new
 A poet should have first hand knowledge these things
3rd source- Figures
 He agrees with this source that when sublimity is achieves so then this
can be applied
Importance of figures
 He says in point A that these figures should be used in manner in
correct place and occasion
 The purpose should also be kept in mind. If the purpose is not there
then negative effect ll be created
 Sensibility to use the figures
 Point B… sublimity should be there, passions and emotions should be
there… figures can only help the sublimity…
 Point C… the figures must be spontaneous… it must not be forced and
deliberate… he says that the lesser light of figure must be hidden by the
greater light of passion…
 Figures are like candles that are feeble and dim.. in sun this is lost…
Some Figures… Abjuration is renunciation
 Adjuration or Apostrophe= swearing or taking an oath. Greeks would
swear on solemn occasions…
  In the Holy Quran when swear is taken on time.. seriousness,
solemnness and threateness… if there is seriousness that is supernatural
and if not then that is disgraced. Sun, moon, galloping of horses..
 Example of demosthene when he swears by the fighters of his land who
laid down their lives for the cause of freedom
 Example of Shaheed in islam
 The act had elevated the people, the people have elevated emotion and
the emotion has raised the style.
2nd figure= Interrogation or Rhetorical Question… first to know, second to
test the knowledge, when we answer
 To put the answer first and ask by the speaker
3rd figure= Asyndeton which means the conjunctions are left out normally.
When there is a continuous struggle going on.
4th figure= Hyperbaton= in grammar there is the right order of words but we
don’t observe this order by great writers.
 When the words are used in a confused manner instead of a linear
manner
 When we are fearful or angry
5th Figure= Polyptoton = the use of singular for plural and plural for singular..
using first person for the second or third person and so on. Using past tense
for present and present for past..
It makes things immediate not correct grammatically
God talks of Himself as we, I or He to make his nearness feel.
4th source= diction or arrangement of words… words are the light of
thoughts.. they make thought manifest..
 From the darkness of soul and darkness of unconsciousness they bring
thought to light
 Relationship between thoughts and words/ like soul and body
 Strong and powerful words will explain powerful thoughts
 Slang can be used
 When there are profound thoughts born out of insight we use
metaphors
  All poetry is metaphoric.. Chapman’s Homer
 A poet deals with poetic truth instead of scientific truth
 Much Have I travelled in the realms of gold,
And many goodly states and kingdoms seen
Round many western islands have I been;
 Great kings=great books, realms of gold= poetry
 Because of great experience one has to be metaphoric
5th source= Composition
 It must be a complete hole.. which must have organic unity with nothing
superfluous and nothing wanting. Everything must be necessary and its
right place. If we remove even one bit from it the whole unity is
destroyed
 The whole is something more than the mere sum of its parts
 Like a machine or living organism
 The composition must have the unity of and harmony of music
 The harmony is provided by composition
 Composition is special melody of words
Which moves us more A Faulty Genius or a Faultless Poet… a faultless writer
cannot be sublime
 Why is the work of genius invariably faulty and why does a writer who
is faultless, remains a mediocre
 A faultless writer cannot be sublime or his works cannot have sublimity
 The first reason is that the rules only deal with the diction instead of the
soul of the poem
 If the soul is compromised then submlity is not there
 The second reason is how did we arrive at rules? We arrived at the rules
by studying the practice of great writers…
 The rules of Sophocles we arrived at the rules
 Longinus says that there are many roads to greatness. Which means by
following rules greatness cannot be achived… roads to god…
 3 things in great literature 1. Spirit of the age 2. Ethos of the people and
ideas and attitudes 3. Individual vision of life of a writer.
 3rd reason= observing rules is a conscious and deliberate process.
 Finally, genius is a man whose aims are very high. He is bold and
daring, caring not for danger. The genius doesn’t bother about the peril.
 What we admire more?
Candle light= which is useful…. Volcano= it admires
Stream=useful… sea= it admires
Comparison of Applolonious and Homer who had flaws
Faultless Hyperides and Faulty Demosthene
FALSE SUBLIME= Tumidity
 Hellenistic writers followed the outer layer
 First fault was turgidity or timidity
 Relationship between matter and manner it means when the thought is
not great but the form is great
 It is just like a disease of fatter man like a balloon (Dropsy)
 Pompous style and nothing good in it. Imbalance of manner and matter
 This fault is in great poets too like wordsworth
2nd Fault is Puerility which is opposite of the first one. It is a pedant’s conceit.
 Pedant is a person who wants to show his bookish knowledge and
display his learning
 To show himself a great scholar
 He thinks of conceits
 A deliberate attempt to show the style higher and grand
 So if we think, bookish knowledge is not necessary
 Like shakespare had no schooling, like this keats and dickens
3rd Fault
 Frigidity= puerility starts with novelty and ends with frigidity
 Some people cannot be touched by emotions and passions
 They are frigid emotionally and mentally
 How come a person without enthusiasm will become sublime?
 A writer can move others out of his depth
 A frigid person cannot understand the tragedies of others
 Difference between novelty and originality
 Being novel will make you superior but it is not originality
 A frigid writers cannot write about great emotions and passions
appropriately
4th Fault= Affectation
 Parenthysus= this is again imbalance
 Imbalance of situation and emotions
 When the situation is not pathetic and the writer tries to arouse pathetic
emotions
 When Macduff’s children were butchered he says, but he has no
children
5th fault is Turbidity which means lack of clarity and confusion

AN APOLOGY FOR POETRY BY PHILIP SIDNEY

Historical Background
 Longinus=1st century AD.. after him Greek civilization came into an end
 Romans were practical and they made contributions in the field of law
 Great administrators and organizers
 The fall of Greece was the rise of Rome
 4th Ad= conversion to Christianity = not a state religion
 Religion of the poors and outcasts and was not worldly
 For help and salvation this religion was followed
 Roman civil war= Constantine and Christian help dark age
 Constantine was the rival for roman throne who sought help of
Christianity as a shield
 Worldly amibitions were sin
 Now became a political state religion.. priests and bishops became rulers
 The Christians were persecutors which was the end of romans
 Dark ages from 4th to 14th century
 Renaissance