These selections are mostly from Aristotle’s Poetics, with the addition of a related passage from his Politics. The notes below arrange them by topic rather than by their order in text. You should (i) get a sense of what Aristotle’s views are (but don’t expect them to be entirely clear—scholars disagree about what he means), (ii) compare them to views on these topics expressed in Republic X (which I will refer to as “Plato’s views”), and (iii) think where you stand regarding the issues on which they differ.
On imitation, truth, and knowledge:
• Poetics, ch. 1-1st ¶ of ch. 4 (HK 97-100). Chapters 1-3 provide an introduction to the Poetics and a sample of a typical Aristotelian effort at classification. But together with the first paragraph of chapter 4, they also provide a first look at Aristotle’s view of imitation. Although it isn’t obviously inconsistent with the view in the Republic, it is clearly more positive and you should begin thinking about how Aristotle’s view compares with Plato’s.
• Poetics, 1st ¶ of ch. 9 (HK 106-107). The comparison of poetry and history in the first paragraph of ch. 9 provides an alternative to Plato’s view of reality and truth in art. Someone who disagrees with Plato might still not agree with Aristotle, so you should both compare the views of the two and think critically about what Aristotle says in its own right.
• Poetics, ch. 25 (HK 122-124). This account of responses to critics (the list of problems Aristotle seems to refer to here has not survived) adds a little more to Aristotle’s view of the sort of representation in found in poetry. The most closely analogous passage in what you have read from Plato is the selection from book II of the Laws, especially the very end (HK 51). You might also think about the extent to which and manner in which what Aristotle says here could be extended to painting or sculpture.
On art and the emotions:
• Poetics, 1st ¶ of ch. 6 (HK 102). This paragraph formulates Aristotle’s view of tragedy as a definition, another typically Aristotelian thing to do. Pay special attention to the role of fear and pity because this can be seen as an alternative to Plato’s view of the effect of poetry.
• Poetics, chs. 13-14 (HK 109-112). These chapters give a little more detail about how fear and pity are aroused. Aristotle is very specific about the sort of incidents that lead to them and that may help to clarify the sort of emotions he has in mind. Don’t worry that you’ve misunderstood something if the two chapters don’t seem to fit well together; there is a clear discrepancy between them in the sort of plot he counts as the best even (if not in the theory that lies behind that judgment).
• Politics, bk. 8 ch. 7 (HK 137). This passage has more on the value of art (here music). Pay special attention to the comments on “purgation.” That is a translation of the Greek term katharsis, whose English version was used instead in the translation of the Poetics (and the reference in the Politics to a more precise discussion of the idea is a reference to the Poetics). The Greek term was used for both medical purgation and religious purification, and modern interpretations of Aristotle tend to differ in whether they see him as comparing the function of tragedy with one or the other of the two. As with the first group of passages, it is worth thinking whether these ideas could be extended to painting and sculpture.
Although it’s not part of your assignment (because we won’t have time to discuss it in class), you might also look at Poetics, chs. 7-8 (HK 104-106). These comments on beauty (in 7) and on unity (in 8) are discussions of grounds for judging art.
The natural broader questions to think about begin from the question of whether what you have found in Aristotle or the views in Republic X are closer to the truth regarding the relation between the fine arts and truth and regarding their connections with the emotions. There are two aspects to each of these issues:
• What is the best description of the relations between the arts and truth and between the arts and emotions?
• What are the implications of these relations for the value of the arts?
Although Plato and Aristotle are natural starting points here, you needn’t stay within their vicinity. Even if one of them seems closer to the truth than the other, both may be farther from the truth than they are from each other.