turns given to the language when spoken; e.g. the difference between
command and prayer, simple statement and threat, question and answer,
and so forth. The theory of such matters, however, belongs to Elocution
and the professors of that art. Whether the poet knows these things or
not, his art as a poet is never seriously criticized on that account.
What fault can one see in Homer's 'Sing of the wrath, Goddess'?--which
Protagoras has criticized as being a command where a prayer was meant,
since to bid one do or not do, he tells us, is a command. Let us pass
over this, then, as appertaining to another art, and not to that of
poetry.
20
The Diction viewed as a whole is made up of the following parts:
the Letter (or ultimate element), the Syllable, the Conjunction, the
Article, the Noun, the Verb, the Case, and the Speech. (1) The Letter is
an indivisible sound of a particular kind, one that may become a factor
in an intelligible sound. Indivisible sounds are uttered by the brutes
also, but no one of these is a Letter in our sense of the term. These
elementary sounds are either vowels, semivowels, or mutes. A vowel is a
Letter having an audible sound without the addition of another Letter.
A semivowel, one having an audible sound by the addition of another
Letter; e.g. S and R. A mute, one having no sound at all by itself, but
becoming audible by an addition, that of one of the Letters which have
a sound of some sort of their own; e.g. D and G. The Letters differ in
various ways: as produced by different conformations or in different
regions of the mouth; as aspirated, not aspirated, or sometimes one
and sometimes the other; as long, short, or of variable quantity; and
further as having an acute grave, or intermediate accent.
The details of these matters we must leave to the metricians. (2) A
Syllable is a nonsignificant composite sound, made up of a mute and a
Letter having a sound (a vowel or semivowel); for GR, without an A,
is just as much a Syllable as GRA, with an A. The various forms of the
Syllable also belong to the theory of metre. (3) A Conjunction is (a) a
non-significant sound which, when one significant sound is formable out
of several, neither hinders nor aids the union, and which, if the Speech
thus formed stands by itself (apart from other Speeches) must not be
inserted at the beginning of it; e.g. _men_, _de_, _toi_, _de_. Or (b)
a non-significant sound capable of combining two or more significant
sounds into one; e.g. _amphi_, _peri_, etc. (4) An Article is a
non-significant sound marking the beginning, end, or dividing-point of
a Speech, its natural place being either at the extremities or in
the middle. (5) A Noun or name is a composite significant sound not
involving the idea of time, with parts which have no significance by
themselves in it. It is to be remembered that in a compound we do not
think of the parts as having a significance also by themselves; in the
name 'Theodorus', for instance, the _doron_ means nothing to us.
(6) A Verb is a composite significant sound involving the idea of
time, with parts which (just as in the Noun) have no significance by
themselves in it. Whereas the word 'man' or 'white' does not imply
_when_, 'walks' and 'has walked' involve in addition to the idea of
walking that of time present or time past.
(7) A Case of a Noun or Verb is when the word means 'of or 'to' a thing,
and so forth, or for one or many (e.g. 'man' and 'men'); or it may
consist merely in the mode of utterance, e.g. in question, command, etc.
'Walked?' and 'Walk!' are Cases of the verb 'to walk' of this last kind.
(8) A Speech is a composite significant sound, some of the parts of
which have a certain significance by themselves. It may be observed that
a Speech is not always made up of Noun and Verb; it may be without a
Verb, like the definition of man; but it will always have some part with
a certain significance by itself. In the Speech 'Cleon walks', 'Cleon'
is an instance of such a part. A Speech is said to be one in two ways,
either as signifying one thing, or as a union of several Speeches made
into one by conjunction. Thus the _Iliad_ is one Speech by conjunction
of several; and the definition of man is one through its signifying one
thing.
21
Nouns are of two kinds, either (1) simple, i.e. made up of
non-significant parts, like the word ge, or (2) double; in the
latter case the word may be made up either of a significant and a
non-significant part (a distinction which disappears in the compound),
or of two significant parts. It is possible also to have triple,
quadruple or higher compounds, like most of our amplified names; e.g.'
Hermocaicoxanthus' and the like.
Whatever its structure, a Noun must always be either (1) the ordinary
word for the thing, or (2) a strange word, or (3) a metaphor, or (4) an
ornamental word, or (5) a coined word, or (6) a word lengthened out, or
(7) curtailed, or (8) altered in form. By the ordinary word I mean
that in general use in a country; and by a strange word, one in use
elsewhere. So that the same word may obviously be at once strange and
ordinary, though not in reference to the same people; _sigunos_, for
instance, is an ordinary word in Cyprus, and a strange word with us.
Metaphor consists in giving the thing a name that belongs to something
else; the transference being either from genus to species, or from
species to genus, or from species to species, or on grounds of analogy.
That from genus to species is eXemplified in 'Here stands my ship'; for
lying at anchor is the 'standing' of a particular kind of thing. That
from species to genus in 'Truly ten thousand good deeds has Ulysses
wrought', where 'ten thousand', which is a particular large number,
is put in place of the generic 'a large number'. That from species to
species in 'Drawing the life with the bronze', and in 'Severing with the
enduring bronze'; where the poet uses 'draw' in the sense of 'sever' and
'sever' in that of 'draw', both words meaning to 'take away' something.
That from analogy is possible whenever there are four terms so related
that the second (B) is to the first (A), as the fourth (D) to the third
(C); for one may then metaphorically put B in lieu of D, and D in lieu
of B. Now and then, too, they qualify the metaphor by adding on to it
that to which the word it supplants is relative. Thus a cup (B) is
in relation to Dionysus (A) what a shield (D) is to Ares (C). The
cup accordingly will be metaphorically described as the 'shield _of
Dionysus_' (D + A), and the shield as the 'cup _of Ares_' (B + C). Or to
take another instance: As old age (D) is to life (C), so is evening (B)
to day (A). One will accordingly describe evening (B) as the 'old age
_of the day_' (D + A)--or by the Empedoclean equivalent; and old age (D)
as the 'evening' or 'sunset of life'' (B + C). It may be that some of
the terms thus related have no special name of their own, but for all
that they will be metaphorically described in just the same way. Thus to
cast forth seed-corn is called 'sowing'; but to cast forth its flame,
as said of the sun, has no special name. This nameless act (B), however,
stands in just the same relation to its object, sunlight (A), as sowing
(D) to the seed-corn (C). Hence the expression in the poet, 'sowing
around a god-created _flame_' (D + A). There is also another form of
qualified metaphor. Having given the thing the alien name, one may by a
negative addition deny of it one of the attributes naturally associated
with its new name. An instance of this would be to call the shield not
the 'cup _of Ares_,' as in the former case, but a 'cup _that holds no
wine_'. * * * A coined word is a name which, being quite unknown among
a people, is given by the poet himself; e.g. (for there are some words
that seem to be of this origin) _hernyges_ for horns, and _areter_ for
priest. A word is said to be lengthened out, when it has a short vowel
made long, or an extra syllable inserted; e. g. _polleos_ for _poleos_,
_Peleiadeo_ for _Peleidon_. It is said to be curtailed, when it has lost
a part; e.g. _kri_, _do_, and _ops_ in _mia ginetai amphoteron ops_.
It is an altered word, when part is left as it was and part is of the
poet's making; e.g. _dexiteron_ for _dexion_, in _dexiteron kata maxon_.
The Nouns themselves (to whatever class they may belong) are either
masculines, feminines, or intermediates (neuter). All ending in N, P,
S, or in the two compounds of this last, PS and X, are masculines. All
ending in the invariably long vowels, H and O, and in A among the vowels
that may be long, are feminines. So that there is an equal number of
masculine and feminine terminations, as PS and X are the same as S,
and need not be counted. There is no Noun, however, ending in a mute
or in either of the two short vowels, E and O. Only three (_meli, kommi,
peperi_) end in I, and five in T. The intermediates, or neuters, end in
the variable vowels or in N, P, X.
22
The perfection of Diction is for it to be at once clear and not mean.
The clearest indeed is that made up of the ordinary words for things,
but it is mean, as is shown by the poetry of Cleophon and Sthenelus. On
the other hand the Diction becomes distinguished and non-prosaic by
the use of unfamiliar terms, i.e. strange words, metaphors, lengthened
forms, and everything that deviates from the ordinary modes of
speech.--But a whole statement in such terms will be either a riddle or
a barbarism, a riddle, if made up of metaphors, a barbarism, if made
up of strange words. The very nature indeed of a riddle is this, to
describe a fact in an impossible combination of words (which cannot be
done with the real names for things, but can be with their metaphorical
substitutes); e.g. 'I saw a man glue brass on another with fire',
and the like. The corresponding use of strange words results in a
barbarism.--A certain admixture, accordingly, of unfamiliar terms
is necessary. These, the strange word, the metaphor, the ornamental
equivalent, etc.. will save the language from seeming mean and prosaic,
while the ordinary words in it will secure the requisite clearness. What
helps most, however, to render the Diction at once clear and non-prosaic
is the use of the lengthened, curtailed, and altered forms of words.
Their deviation from the ordinary words will, by making the language
unlike that in general use give it a non-prosaic appearance; and their
having much in common with the words in general use will give it the
quality of clearness. It is not right, then, to condemn these modes of
speech, and ridicule the poet for using them, as some have done; e.g.
the elder Euclid, who said it was easy to make poetry if one were to
be allowed to lengthen the words in the statement itself as much as
one likes--a procedure he caricatured by reading '_Epixarhon eidon
Marathonade Badi--gonta_, and _ouk han g' eramenos ton ekeinou helle
boron_ as verses. A too apparent use of these licences has certainly a
ludicrous effect, but they are not alone in that; the rule of moderation
applies to all the constituents of the poetic vocabulary; even with
metaphors, strange words, and the rest, the effect will be the same,
if one uses them improperly and with a view to provoking laughter. The
proper use of them is a very different thing. To realize the difference
one should take an epic verse and see how it reads when the normal words
are introduced. The same should be done too with the strange word, the
metaphor, and the rest; for one has only to put the ordinary words in
their place to see the truth of what we are saying. The same iambic, for
instance, is found in Aeschylus and Euripides, and as it stands in the
former it is a poor line; whereas Euripides, by the change of a single
word, the substitution of a strange for what is by usage the ordinary
word, has made it seem a fine one. Aeschylus having said in his
_Philoctetes_:
_phagedaina he mon sarkas hesthiei podos_
Euripides has merely altered the hesthiei here into thoinatai. Or
suppose
_nun de m' heon holigos te kai outidanos kai haeikos_
to be altered by the substitution of the ordinary words into
_nun de m' heon mikros te kai hasthenikos kai haeidos_
Or the line
_diphron haeikelion katatheis olingen te trapexan_
into
_diphron moxtheron katatheis mikran te trapexan_
Or heiones boosin into heiones kraxousin. Add to this that Ariphrades
used to ridicule the tragedians for introducing expressions unknown
in the language of common life, _doeaton hapo_ (for _apo domaton_),
_sethen_, _hego de nin_, _Achilleos peri_ (for _peri Achilleos_), and
the like. The mere fact of their not being in ordinary speech gives the
Diction a non-prosaic character; but Ariphrades was unaware of that. It
is a great thing, indeed, to make a proper use of these poetical forms,
as also of compounds and strange words. But the greatest thing by far
is to be a master of metaphor. It is the one thing that cannot be learnt
from others; and it is also a sign of genius, since a good metaphor
implies an intuitive perception of the similarity in dissimilars.
Of the kinds of words we have enumerated it may be observed that
compounds are most in place in the dithyramb, strange words in heroic,
and metaphors in iambic poetry. Heroic poetry, indeed, may avail itself
of them all. But in iambic verse, which models itself as far as possible
on the spoken language, only those kinds of words are in place which are
allowable also in an oration, i.e. the ordinary word, the metaphor, and
the ornamental equivalent.
Let this, then, suffice as an account of Tragedy, the art imitating by
means of action on the stage.
23
As for the poetry which merely narrates, or imitates by means of
versified language (without action), it is evident that it has several
points in common with Tragedy.
I. The construction of its stories should clearly be like that in a
drama; they should be based on a single action, one that is a complete
whole in itself, with a beginning, middle, and end, so as to enable the
work to produce its own proper pleasure with all the organic unity of a
living creature. Nor should one suppose that there is anything like them
in our usual histories. A history has to deal not with one action, but
with one period and all that happened in that to one or more persons,
however disconnected the several events may have been. Just as two
events may take place at the same time, e.g. the sea-fight off Salamis
and the battle with the Carthaginians in Sicily, without converging to
the same end, so too of two consecutive events one may sometimes come
after the other with no one end as their common issue. Nevertheless most
of our epic poets, one may say, ignore the distinction.
Herein, then, to repeat what we have said before, we have a further
proof of Homer's marvellous superiority to the rest. He did not attempt
to deal even with the Trojan war in its entirety, though it was a whole
with a definite beginning and end--through a feeling apparently that
it was too long a story to be taken in in one view, or if not that, too
complicated from the variety of incident in it. As it is, he has singled
out one section of the whole; many of the other incidents, however, he
brings in as episodes, using the Catalogue of the Ships, for instance,
and other episodes to relieve the uniformity of his narrative. As for
the other epic poets, they treat of one man, or one period; or else of
an action which, although one, has a multiplicity of parts in it. This
last is what the authors of the _Cypria_ and _Little_ _Iliad_ have
done. And the result is that, whereas the _Iliad_ or _Odyssey_ supplies
materials for only one, or at most two tragedies, the _Cypria_ does
that for several, and the _Little_ _Iliad_ for more than eight: for an
_Adjudgment of Arms_, a _Philoctetes_, a _Neoptolemus_, a _Eurypylus_,
a _Ulysses as Beggar_, a _Laconian Women_, a _Fall of Ilium_, and a
_Departure of the Fleet_; as also a _Sinon_, and _Women of Troy_.
24
II. Besides this, Epic poetry must divide into the same species as
Tragedy; it must be either simple or complex, a story of character
or one of suffering. Its parts, too, with the exception of Song and
Spectacle, must be the same, as it requires Peripeties, Discoveries, and
scenes of suffering just like Tragedy. Lastly, the Thought and Diction
in it must be good in their way. All these elements appear in Homer
first; and he has made due use of them. His two poems are each examples
of construction, the _Iliad_ simple and a story of suffering, the
_Odyssey_ complex (there is Discovery throughout it) and a story of
character. And they are more than this, since in Diction and Thought too
they surpass all other poems.
There is, however, a difference in the Epic as compared with Tragedy,
(1) in its length, and (2) in its metre. (1) As to its length, the limit
already suggested will suffice: it must be possible for the beginning
and end of the work to be taken in in one view--a condition which will
be fulfilled if the poem be shorter than the old epics, and about
as long as the series of tragedies offered for one hearing. For the
extension of its length epic poetry has a special advantage, of which it
makes large use. In a play one cannot represent an action with a number
of parts going on simultaneously; one is limited to the part on the
stage and connected with the actors. Whereas in epic poetry the narrative
form makes it possible for one to describe a number of simultaneous
incidents; and these, if germane to the subject, increase the body of
the poem. This then is a gain to the Epic, tending to give it grandeur,
and also variety of interest and room for episodes of diverse kinds.
Uniformity of incident by the satiety it soon creates is apt to ruin
tragedies on the stage. (2) As for its metre, the heroic has been
assigned it from experience; were any one to attempt a narrative poem
in some one, or in several, of the other metres, the incongruity of
the thing would be apparent. The heroic; in fact is the gravest and
weightiest of metres--which is what makes it more tolerant than the rest
of strange words and metaphors, that also being a point in which
the narrative form of poetry goes beyond all others. The iambic
and trochaic, on the other hand, are metres of movement, the one
representing that of life and action, the other that of the dance. Still
more unnatural would it appear, it one were to write an epic in a medley
of metres, as Chaeremon did. Hence it is that no one has ever written
a long story in any but heroic verse; nature herself, as we have said,
teaches us to select the metre appropriate to such a story.
Homer, admirable as he is in every other respect, is especially so in
this, that he alone among epic poets is not unaware of the part to be
played by the poet himself in the poem. The poet should say very little
in propria persona, as he is no imitator when doing that. Whereas
the other poets are perpetually coming forward in person, and say but
little, and that only here and there, as imitators, Homer after a brief
preface brings in forthwith a man, a woman, or some other Character--no
one of them characterless, but each with distinctive characteristics.
The marvellous is certainly required in Tragedy. The Epic, however,
affords more opening for the improbable, the chief factor in the
marvellous, because in it the agents are not visibly before one. The
scene of the pursuit of Hector would be ridiculous on the stage--the
Greeks halting instead of pursuing him, and Achilles shaking his head to
stop them; but in the poem the absurdity is overlooked. The marvellous,
however, is a cause of pleasure, as is shown by the fact that we all
tell a story with additions, in the belief that we are doing our hearers
a pleasure.
Homer more than any other has taught the rest of us the art of framing
lies in the right way. I mean the use of paralogism. Whenever, if A is
or happens, a consequent, B, is or happens, men's notion is that, if the
B is, the A also is--but that is a false conclusion. Accordingly, if A
is untrue, but there is something else, B, that on the assumption of its
truth follows as its consequent, the right thing then is to add on the
B. Just because we know the truth of the consequent, we are in our own
minds led on to the erroneous inference of the truth of the antecedent.
Here is an instance, from the Bath-story in the _Odyssey_.
A likely impossibility is always preferable to an unconvincing
possibility. The story should never be made up of improbable incidents;
there should be nothing of the sort in it. If, however, such incidents
are unavoidable, they should be outside the piece, like the hero's
ignorance in _Oedipus_ of the circumstances of Lams' death; not within
it, like the report of the Pythian games in _Electra_, or the man's
having come to Mysia from Tegea without uttering a word on the way, in
_The Mysians_. So that it is ridiculous to say that one's Plot would
have been spoilt without them, since it is fundamentally wrong to make
up such Plots. If the poet has taken such a Plot, however, and one
sees that he might have put it in a more probable form, he is guilty
of absurdity as well as a fault of art. Even in the _Odyssey_ the
improbabilities in the setting-ashore of Ulysses would be clearly
intolerable in the hands of an inferior poet. As it is, the poet
conceals them, his other excellences veiling their absurdity. Elaborate
Diction, however, is required only in places where there is no action,
and no Character or Thought to be revealed. Where there is Character
or Thought, on the other hand, an over-ornate Diction tends to obscure
them.
25
As regards Problems and their Solutions, one may see the number and
nature of the assumptions on which they proceed by viewing the matter in
the following way. (1) The poet being an imitator just like the painter
or other maker of likenesses, he must necessarily in all instances
represent things in one or other of three aspects, either as they were
or are, or as they are said or thought to be or to have been, or as they
ought to be. (2) All this he does in language, with an admixture, it
may be, of strange words and metaphors, as also of the various modified
forms of words, since the use of these is conceded in poetry. (3) It is
to be remembered, too, that there is not the same kind of correctness
in poetry as in politics, or indeed any other art. There is, however,
within the limits of poetry itself a possibility of two kinds of error,
the one directly, the other only accidentally connected with the art. If
the poet meant to describe the thing correctly, and failed through
lack of power of expression, his art itself is at fault. But if it was
through his having meant to describe it in some incorrect way (e.g. to
make the horse in movement have both right legs thrown forward) that the
technical error (one in a matter of, say, medicine or some other special
science), or impossibilities of whatever kind they may be, have got into
his description, his error in that case is not in the essentials of the
poetic art. These, therefore, must be the premisses of the Solutions in
answer to the criticisms involved in the Problems.
I. As to the criticisms relating to the poet's art itself. Any
impossibilities there may be in his descriptions of things are faults.
But from another point of view they are justifiable, if they serve the
end of poetry itself--if (to assume what we have said of that end) they
make the effect of some portion of the work more astounding. The Pursuit
of Hector is an instance in point. If, however, the poetic end might
have been as well or better attained without sacrifice of technical
correctness in such matters, the impossibility is not to be justified,
since the description should be, if it can, entirely free from error.
One may ask, too, whether the error is in a matter directly or only
accidentally connected with the poetic art; since it is a lesser error
in an artist not to know, for instance, that the hind has no horns, than
to produce an unrecognizable picture of one.