ABSTRACT
In a famous passage in Chapter 9 in the Poetics (1451a36-bll), Aristotle disparages history (historia) in comparison with poetry (poiēsis). He begins by stating that "the function of a poet is to describe not what has happened (ta genomena) but the kind of thing that might happen, 2 and what is possible according to probability or necessity" (hoia an genoito, kai ta dunata kata to eikos ē to anangkaion). He goes on to say that the distinction between historian and poet (historikos and poiētēs) resides not in the one writing prose and other verse (for the work of Herodotus, he says, if put into verse, would still be history) but "in the fact that the one [history] describes what has happened, the other [poetry] what might happen." The conclusion he proceeds to draw is that "poetry is something more philosophic and more worthwhile (spoudaioteron) than history, because poetry deals rather with universals, history with particulars" (hē men gar poiēsis mallon ta katholou, hē d' historia ta kath' hekaston legei). And Aristotle goes on to explain what he means by "universals" and "particulars:" universal statements are about what a particular kind of man will say or do "according to probability or necessity:" particular statements are about "what Alcibiades did or had done to him."
