ISSN:
0009-8388
Source:
Cambridge Journals Digital Archives
Topics:
Classical Studies
Notes:
In Poetics chapter 9, Aristotle claims that the poet's function differs from the historian's. The historian should describe what has happened, but the poet should say ‘what sorts of thing might happen, that is, the things possible according to likelihood or necessity’ (1451a36–8). The difference is not between fiction and non-fiction. Some past events happened according to likelihood and are thereby candidates for poetic representation (1451b29–32). Rather, the poet differs from the historian with respect to the level of abstraction at which he considers the actions and experiences of agents. The historian should engage in accurate and thorough ἱστορ⋯α—‘research’ or ‘fact-gathering’—by carefully recording his or others' observations of particular events. The poet, on the other hand, looks for causal relations among fictional or non-fictional events, for he cares whether his composition has a plot with events that happen because of other events and not merely after them (cf. 1452a20–l). The poet may discern in the historian's materials some causally related events fit for dramatic or epic representation, but that is not the historian's concern. As Aristotle says in chapter 23, the historian should report ‘whatever befell one or more people during a particular period of time, each of the events relating to the others by chance’ (1459a23–4). The last clause is an overstatement; we have just noticed Aristotle's admission that some past events were likely to happen. Also, he elsewhere says that ‘future events will for the most part be like past events’, presumably because they share a similar causal structure (Rh. 1394a8). The remark's point is clear enough, though: the historian should report what happened whether or not the events exhibit explanatory coherence.
Type of Medium:
Electronic Resource
URL:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/cq/48.2.447
Permalink
