Aristotle's Poetics

In Our Time: Culture

BBC

History

4.5 • 1K Ratings

🗓️ 27 January 2011

⏱️ 43 minutes

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Summary

Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss Aristotle's Poetics. The Poetics is, as far as we know, the first ever work of literary theory. Written in the 4th century BC, it is the work of a scholar who was also a biologist, and treats literary works with the detached analytical eye of a scientist. Aristotle examines drama and epic poetry, and how they achieve their effects; he analyses tragedy and the ways in which it plays on our emotions. Many of the ideas he articulates, such as catharsis, have remained in our critical vocabulary ever since. The book also contains an impassioned defence of poetry, which had been attacked by other thinkers, including Aristotle's own teacher Plato.Translated by medieval Arab scholars, the Poetics was rediscovered in Europe during the Renaissance and became a playwriting manual for many dramatists of the era. Today it remains a standard text for would-be Hollywood screenwriters.With:Angie HobbsAssociate Professor of Philosophy and Senior Fellow in the Public Understanding of Philosophy at the University of WarwickNick LoweReader in Classical Literature at Royal Holloway, University of LondonStephen HalliwellProfessor of Greek at the University of St AndrewsProducer: Thomas Morris.

Transcript

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0:46.0	Hello in the 4th century BC the Greek philosopher and biologist Aristotle wrote a book about plays and how to construct them. He set down on paper his
0:55.1	opinion of the works of Sophocles and Euripides and gave some hints on how to write a
0:59.9	successful tragedy. Aristotle's book is called The Poetics, and as far as we know, it's the earliest surviving
1:06.2	work of literary criticism and the most influential.
1:09.9	The work contains ideas that resonated down the centuries. It was translated by Arab scholars
1:15.1	and provided Renaissance playwrights with a rulebook for writing great drama. And even today,
1:19.9	it uses a manual on Hollywood screenwriting courses. With me to discuss Aristotle's Poetics,
1:25.6	Arangi Hobbs, Associate Professor of Philosophy and Senior Fellow in the Public Understanding of Philosophy
1:31.0	at the University of Warwick,
	...

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