ABSTRACT
Aristotle’s Poetics is the single most influential work of literary criticism in the Western tradition and, along with Plato’s Republic, is a foundational text for the understanding of mimesis. Very little is known about the origin and composition of the treatise, but it is most likely an incomplete or fragmentary compilation of lecture notes on tragic drama and related subjects, written sometime between 360 and 320 BCE, and probably addressed to and later compiled by students at Aristotle’s school, the Lyceum, in Athens. The Poetics has long shaped critical accounts of ancient drama, and was treated by playwrights as a prescriptive guidebook for hundreds of years after its rediscovery and translation into Latin by scholars in the early Renaissance. Aristotle’s chief subject is Greek tragedy, but his account of this form engages far-reaching questions about the nature of mimesis that powerfully revise Plato’s theories. Aristotle’s approach to mimesis is understated. What seem to be superficial assertions about narrative form or audience response are guided by sophisticated ideas about mimesis that, in many cases, have yet to be fully assimilated into contemporary popular discussions of art and literature.
