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Chapter 7
Themes
and Colors
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Poetics, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Tragedy vs. Epic Poetry
Imitation
Fear, Pity, and Catharsis
Component Parts and Balance
Summary
Analysis
8.1 Character. There are four things that go into making a good character. The first is goodness: speech and actions have character, as they reveal the essence of a specific choice. If the choice is good, the character is good as well. The second is appropriateness: if a character is courageous, they must be courageous in accordance with what type of character they are. For example, it is inappropriate for a woman to demonstrate “courage or cleverness” in the same way as a man.
Women during Aristotle’s time were not stereotypically “courageous and clever,” since most believe that these were traits more likely found in men. Therefore, Aristotle argues that it is inappropriate (during his time, that is) for women to be depicted as such. A character must be either good or bad, but that character must be in keeping with whom, or rather what, they are meant to imitate.
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The third thing that makes a good character is likeness, but this is not to say that a character is likable. The fourth is consistency: even if a character’s specific actions are inconsistent and this is fitting of their supposed character, such inconsistencies should be “consistently inconsistent.” Menelaus in Orestes is an example of “unnecessary badness” in a character, and Iphigeneia in Aulis, when Iphigeneia pleads for her life, is an example of inconsistency. However, in these examples, it is necessary or probable that the characters behave in precisely such ways, so they can be considered “consistently inconsistent.”
Likeness refers to the appropriateness of an imitation (how well it imitates something)—not a character’s likability. Aristotle’s language here is a bit tricky, but what he means to say is that if it is in a specific character’s disposition to be inconsistent, they must be inconsistent in the same way all the time. The only exception to this rule is if inconsistency is necessary or probable. Iphigeneia is Aristotle’s example. When Iphigeneia is first set to be sacrificed, she begs for her life, but she soon comes to except her fate and embraces death. This inconsistency in Iphigeneia’s actions is probable—she isn’t likely to escape sacrifice, so she accepts it. She does escape, but for Aristotle, this is beside the point.
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The resolution of the plot should come about from the plot as well—it shouldn’t rely on “theatrical device” as in Medea or the Iliad. “Theatrical devices” can be employed for things outside of the play, such as the power of gods, but there should be nothing irrational in the plot itself.
A tragedy should imitate people who are better than us, Aristotle repeats, so poets “should imitate good portrait-painters.” Good portrait-painters paint subjects as they are, only they make them better-looking. Even characters who have bad traits should be portrayed as good people, like Homer’s portrayal of Achilles.
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8.2 Kinds of Recognition. The first and least artistic kind of recognition involves tokens: some tokens are congenital, like a birthmark, and some are acquired, like a scar. Tokens can also be external, like jewelry or a boat. For example, Odysseus is recognized by a scar. If recognition is employed merely for confirmation, this is less artistic than recognition that comes about from reversal, which is best. This superior kind of recognition can be observed “in the bath-scene” of Homer’s Odyssey.
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The second kind of recognition is created by the poet, and this form of recognition is not very artistic either. In the Iphigeneia, Orestes reveals his own identity, but Iphigeneia’s identity is revealed through a letter. “Orestes declares in person what the poet (instead of the plot) requires,” Aristotle says. That is, Orestes tells Iphigeneia he is her brother, but he could just as easily have been identified through a token of some kind, so this recognition isn’t really superior to the kind that tokens can trigger.
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The third kind of recognition is the kind that arises from memory, when a character suddenly realizes something they forgot. Aristotle again raises the example of Odysseus, who weeps at the sound of a lyre because he is reminded of his past. This reminder results in a recognition. The fourth kind of recognition are those that come about from inference, like in the Sons of Phineus, in which the women surmise that it is their fate to die. There is also recognition that comes from “false inference,” as it does in Odysseus the False Messenger. The best kind of recognition comes from the plot—the course of events—and it is probable, as in Sophocles’s Oedipus Rex and the Iphigeneia (Iphigeneia’s letter, Aristotle points out, “is probable”). This is the best kind of recognition because it doesn’t rely on any kind of token, and inference is the second-best kind of recognition.
8.3 Visualizing the Action. Poets should always visualize the plot as they construct it. In doing so, a poet can spot inconsistencies and inappropriateness. Plots should also include the use of gestures, and such gestures are most believable if they are performed by those who are actually feeling the emotion the gesture is meant to imitate. “This is why,” Aristotle says, “the art of poetry belongs to people who are naturally gifted or mad.” The actions of the insane or talented appear the most authentic.
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8.4 Outlines and Episodization. Stories should bet set out first in “universal terms,” and then they should be turned into episodes and expounded on. An example of what Aristotle means by “universal terms” is the Iphigeneia, in which a girl is supposed to be sacrificed but disappears without anyone knowing. She goes to another country where the custom is to sacrifice foreigners, but instead she’s hailed as a priestess and spared. Her brother arrives and is captured, but before he is sacrificed, he discloses his identity and escapes. These are the “universal terms” of the Iphigeneia, Aristotle says, and Euripides turned these terms into episodes in his play.
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Episodes must be appropriate and concise in tragedy, but in epic poetry, they are often used to make a story longer. Take Homer’s Odyssey. The story itself is short: a man is alone and away from home under close watch by Poseidon. While he is gone, his property is misspent and a plot is executed against his son. The man is shipwrecked, but he manages to get home, where he reveals his identity and destroys his enemies. Most of the Odyssey, Aristotle says, “is episodes.”
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8.5 Complication and Resolution. A tragedy must have complication and resolution. According to Aristotle, the complication is “everything from the beginning up to and including the section which immediately precedes” the change of fortune. The resolution, he says, is “everything from the beginning of the change of fortune to the end.” A complication can occur even outside the events of a play, as in Lyceus, Aristotle says, in which the child is taken before the play starts.
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8.6 Kinds of Tragedy. According to Aristotle, there are four different kinds of tragedy: complex tragedy, which relies on reversal and recognition; tragedy of suffering, like plays about Ajax; tragedy of character, like Women of Phthia; and simple tragedy, like Prometheus and plays about the underworld. A tragedy should include all the component parts, but it is usually judged by its plot. Therefore, both complication and resolution should be constructed with the same attention.
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8.7 Tragedy and Epic. A tragedy should not be constructed from material that would be better be as an epic. For instance, the Iliad contains many stories and is not appropriate for a tragedy because it’s so long that the stories wouldn’t have the right magnitude.
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8.8 Astonishment. Poets should use astonishment when constructing reversals and simple actions. This is achieved when characters who are “clever but bad” are deceived. Such an action is not improbable, Aristotle argues, because it is likely for unlikely things to happen.
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8.9 The Chorus. The chorus is like any actor in a play and should contribute to the play as a whole. However, the poet need not write choral lyrics as they do the rest of the play—musical interludes can simply be marked and left to the producer to fill in.
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