Imitation Plato And Aristotle
Imitation Plato and Aristotle
Introduction
Plato and Aristotle are two famous literary critics in ancient Greece. Aristotle is Plato’s student. They all agree that art is a form of imitation. However, their attitudes towards imitation are profoundly different. Plato claims that poetry is worthless and bad because it is mere imitation and may have bad influence on human beings. Instead, though Aristotle admits that poetry is imitation, he thinks that it is all right and even good. He also explains that imitation of life should be valued rather than discounted (“Plato and Aristotle”). This paper is to discuss the different understandings of Plato and Aristotle on imitation.
Imitation of Plato
Plato thinks that poetry is a form of imitation. However, he is deeply suspicious of the arts because, in his view, they appeal to the emotions rather than to the intellect (Michael). He thinks that this imitation is far removed from the reality and it is only a “game”. As a result, it is worthless and bad. He also claims that imitation in tragedy can have a bad influence on human beings. As he says in The Republic, a good imitation can undermine the stability of even the best humans by making us feel sad, depressed, and sorrowful about life itself.
Firstly, Plato claims that an imitation is at three steps removed from the reality or truth of something (“Plato and Aristotle on Art as Imitation”). In Plato’s opinion, knowledge of truth and knowledge of good are virtually inseparable. If there is no truth, there is no good too. As a result, he counsels rejection of the physical in favor of embracing reason in an abstract, intellectual, and ultimately more human, existence (Stephen). Plato thinks that the world of appearance does not really represent the reality because in his opinion, it is the forms which can only represent the essence of the world. The tangible world is imperfect because there are many kinds of appearance but there is only one thing...
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