Aristotle's Poetics, Etc. and Demetrius on Style

ARISTOTLES POETICS, ETC. AND DEMETRIUS ON STYLE - INTRODUCTION - TWO nations in antiquity have done more to enrich the world with the works of literature than any others. These two nations are the Hebrew and the Greek. Of the origins of the literature of both these peoples we know little. That there were definite canons of art there can be little doubt-but, for the most part, their art was unconscious. Both excelled as story-tellers but their narrative has little of the verbosity and the irrelevance of many early story-tellers. The growth and development of the skill of both peoples seem to have been a natural and unconscious process. The Homeric rhapsodes certainly had certain clear canons of art and metre, and the Jewish writers had definite laws of rhythm and balance but both peoples seem to have relied, above all, on their own amazing sense of style. Take, for example, the exquisite lament of David over Absalom, in the Second Book of Samuel xviii 33 And the king was much moved, and went up to the chamber over the gate and wept and as he went, thus he said, 0 my son Absalom, my son, my son, Absalom Would God I had died for thee, 0 Absalom, my son, my son Later writers on style, when literature becomes conscious and imitative, might analyse the method used to produce the sublime effect. Demetrius in his treatise On Style might have quoted the passage, had he known it, as an instance of S h o l a b u t the writer of the passage wrote without such self-analysis, and instinctively gave free play to his own wonderful power of pathos. Literary criticism and analysis of style begin with Aristotle. It is natural for a later age to take up the old masters and try to discover the secrets oftheir power. As aids to literary enjoyment and appreciation, it is important that the essays of such critics should be in the hands of modem students, and the present volume is an attempt to show the development of literary criticism in a later age, when the writers art becomes conscious and imitative. It is not enough to know what to say, but it is necessary also to say it in the right way 03 y p 6ndXpr TA Zxjlfcv d 86 A E L C v M, civaiyq a l a a S 8 i eireiv. This volume rightly begins with Aristotle. In the history of European thought, down to the time of the revival of learning, Aristotle reigned supreme. He treated of every subject which came within the scope of ancient thought. 1 an age when learning waxeddim, almost all secular writings but those of Aristotle had dropped out of notice in Europe. Universities and schools were founded on Aristotle, and for several centuries he reigned without a rival in all the universities of Europe. It is, therefore, quite natural for Chaucer, in the Prologue to the Canterbury Tales, to speak of the Clerk of Oxenford as devoting all his thoughts to the study of Aristotle For hym was lever have at his beddes heed Twenty bookes, clad in blak or reed, Of Aristotle and his philosophic, Than robes riche, or fithele, or gay sautrie...