Aristotle Poetics 25.10

Theodore Alois Buckley (Translator)

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Further still, it should be considered whether the error ranks among things essential to the poetic art, or foreign and incidental. For it is a less fault not to know that a hind has no horns, than to depict a bad copy of one. Besides this, also, if the poet is blamed for 1 not imitating things as they truly are, the reply is, but he imitates them as they should be. Thus Sophocles said, that he described men such as they should be, but Euripides such as they are.

Poetics. Aristotle. Theodore Alois Buckley (Translator). London. 1857.

Current edition Experimental

The Poetic of Aristotle (Theodore Alois Buckley) (OCR draft) (English) (Theodore Alois Buckley's English translation, first published in 1850 and represented from the Henry G. Bohn 1857 printing; corrected against a second OCR and aligned to the Kassel reference passage sequence.)

Provisional text from uncorrected OCR; expect errors.

Editions (4)
Περὶ ποιητικῆς (OCR draft) (Aristotle, Poetics. Immanuel Bekker, editor, Aristotelis Opera, volume 2. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1837.) — 25 focus
Περὶ ποιητικῆς (OCR draft) Perseus (Aristotle, De arte poetica liber. Rudolf Kassel, editor. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1965. Reference edition for passage alignment.) — 25 focus
Poetics, Greek text (Ingram Bywater, 1909) (OCR draft) Experimental (Ingram Bywater's Greek text of Aristotle's Poetics, published in 1909.) — 25 focus
Poetics, Greek text (Franz Ritter, 1839) (OCR draft) Experimental (Franz Ritter's 1839 Greek edition, corrected against OCR of the represented copy and aligned to the conventional Perseus chapter-and-subchapter sequence.) — 25 focus
Translations (13)
Poetics (W. H. Fyfe) (OCR draft) Perseus (William Hamilton Fyfe's English translation of Aristotle's Poetics, Loeb Classical Library, 1939 printing.) — 25 focus
Arabic Poetics (Badawī edition, 1953) (OCR draft) (The ancient Arabic translation of Aristotle's Poetics in ʿAbd al-Raḥmān Badawī's 1953 edition.) — 25 focus
Poetics (S. H. Butcher, 1911) (OCR draft) Experimental (S. H. Butcher's English translation from Aristotle's Theory of Poetry and Fine Art, fourth edition, 1911.) — 25 focus
Aristotle on the Art of Poetry (Ingram Bywater, 1909) (OCR draft) Experimental (Ingram Bywater's English translation of Aristotle's Poetics, published in 1909.) — 25 focus
Poetics (Thomas Twining, 1789) (OCR draft) Experimental (Thomas Twining's English translation of Aristotle's Poetics, published in 1789 and aligned to the Kassel reference passage sequence.) — 25.10 focus
Still we are to consider, farther, whether a fault be in things essential to the Poetic art, or foreign and incidental to it: for it is a far more pardonable fault to be ignorant, for instance, that a hind has no horns 1 , than to paint one badly.
The Poetic of Aristotle (Henry James Pye, revised 1792) (OCR draft) Experimental (Henry James Pye's revised 1792 English translation, corrected against the 1788 first edition, aligned to the Kassel reference edition, and supplied with a selective apparatus of substantive 1788 readings.) — 25.10 focus
Some objections may be answered by recurring to the various properties. of language. The word may be foreign as in this passage of Homer;
Poetica Latine conversa (Franciscus Ritter, 1839) (OCR draft) Experimental (Franz Ritter's Latin translation, corrected against OCR of the represented copy and aligned to the conventional Perseus chapter-and-subchapter sequence.) — 25 focus
La poëtique d'Aristote (André Dacier, 1692) (OCR draft) Experimental (André Dacier's French translation of Aristotle's Poetics, published in 1692.) — 25.10 focus
Il faut encore bien examiner ſi la faute, dont il eſt queſtion, eſt faite contre l'art du Poëte, ou ſi c'eſt une faute par quelqu'autre accident que ce ſoit. Car la derniere eſt bien plus legere, & on excuſera bien plus volontiers un Poëte qui aura ignoré que les biches n'ont point de cornes, que celuy qui aura fait une méchante imitation.
Poetica d'Aristotile (Bernardo Segni, 1549) (OCR draft) Experimental (Bernardo Segni's 1549 Florentine Italian translation, aligned to the Kassel reference passage sequence.) — 25 focus
De poetica (Antonio Riccobono, 1587) (OCR draft) Experimental (Antonio Riccobono's Latin translation, first published in 1587; text represented from Immanuel Bekker's 1831 edition.) — 25 focus
De arte poetica liber (William of Moerbeke, ca. 1277) (OCR draft) Experimental (William of Moerbeke's medieval Latin translation, represented by the 1953 Aristoteles Latinus edition.) — 25 focus
Arabic Poetics (Abū Bishr Mattā; Tkatsch edition) (OCR draft) Experimental (The Arabic translation attributed to Abū Bishr Mattā, edited by Jaroslaus Tkatsch in 1928 and aligned to the Kassel reference passage sequence.) — 25 focus
Arabic Poetics (Abū Bishr Mattā; Tkatsch edition, unaligned) (OCR draft) Experimental (Tkatsch's edition of the medieval Arabic translation in its original, unaligned segmentation.) — 25 focus

Notes on the current edition

Poetics

1. 6.

Commentary

Commentary on the Poetics (Ingram Bywater, 1909) (OCR draft) (Ingram Bywater's English commentary on Aristotle's Poetics.) focus

10. mvp-aristotle-comment-986

1460b29 ἔτι ποτέρων ἐστὶ τὸ ἁμάρτημα κτέ. is not a λύσις proper, but an attempt to minimize the offence. In a λύσις proper the point to which the opponent has taken exception is shown to have another aspect, and to be right ( ὀρθῶς ἔχει b 24 ) when viewed in that other aspect.

10. mvp-aristotle-comment-987

1460b30 τῶν κατὰ τὴν τέχνην: in matters belonging to his art, i. e. the art of poetry, as distinct from matters outside poetry, and only acci- dentally ( κατὰ συμβεβηκός) connected with it. Vahlen draws attention to the change of construction, κατ' ἄλλο συμβεβηκός instead of τῶν κατὰ συμβεβηκός. For the appositional clause after ποτέρων comp. Eth. N. 9. 1, 1164 a 22 , and Rhet. 3. 5, 1407 b 15 .

10. mvp-aristotle-comment-988

1460b31 ἔλαφος θήλεια κέρατα οὐκ ἔχει: Η. Α. 4. 11, 538 a 18
κέρατα ἔλαφος θήλεια οὐκ ἔχει.
- De part. an. 3. 1, 662 a 1
τῶν ἐλάφων οἱ μὲν ἄρρενες ἔχουσι κέρατα, αἱ δὲ θήλειαι οὐκ ἔχουσιν.
 The hind seems to have often been represented as having horns not only by poets ( v. Nauck, Aristophanis Byz. fr. p. 61 ), but also by artists; comp. the Scholiast on Pindar Ol. 3, 52 :
ἐπιμελῶς οἱ ποιηταὶ τὴν θήλειαν ἔλαφον κέρατα ἔχουσαν εἰσάγουσιν, καθάπερ καὶ τὴν θηλάζουσαν τὸν Τήλεφον γράφουσι καὶ πλάττουσιν.

10. mvp-aristotle-comment-989

1460b32 ἀμιμήτως is the opposite of μιμητικῶς. In Probl. 29. 10, 951 a 6 (the only Aristotelian passage in which it recurs) ἀμίμητος is the opposite of μιμητός; but it is not uncommon with negative words of this type to have two senses, an active as well as a passive; ἀναίσθητος, for instance, is the opposite not only of αἰσθητός but also of αἰσθητικός. The negative idea in this and similar privative terms must not be pressed too far (see on ἀήθεις 6, 1450a25 ); ἀμιμήτως ἔγραψεν only means that the picture did not adequately express the artist's meaning, i. e. did not express it in a way to be understood by others. A failure of this kind, which arises δι' ἀδυναμίαν, through lack of artistic capacity (see above on b 17 ), is inexcusable in a μιμητής, whose work must be intelligible, if it is to give us the pleasure of a μίμημα ( v. 4, 1448 a 15 ).

Remarques sur la poëtique d'Aristote (André Dacier, 1692) (OCR draft) (André Dacier's French commentary on Aristotle's Poetics.) focus

14. mvp-aristotle-comment-609

25.10 14. Il faut encore bien examiner ſi la faute, dont il eſt queftion, est faite contre l'art du Poëte, ou ſic'est une faute par quelqu'autre accident que ce foit. ] 1

15. mvp-aristotle-comment-610

25.10 15. Et on excufera bien plus volontiers un Poëte qui aura igno-ré que les biches n'ont point de cornes, que celuy qui aura fait une méchante imitation.] 2

Commentary on the Poetics (Thomas Twining, 1789) (OCR draft) (Thomas Twining's notes on Aristotle's Poetics, aligned to the Kassel reference edition.) focus

235. mvp-aristotle-comment-235

NOTE 235.

25.10 P. 124. WHETHER A FAULT BE, &C.
Ποτέρων ἐστὶ τὸ ἁμάρτημα τῶν κατὰ τὴν τέχνην, ἢ κατ’ ἄλλο συμβεβηκός.
—I cannot perceive, that this wants any emendation; much less, that it is, as Mr. Winstanley says,
"nullo sensu."
He contends for the certainty of
ΑΤΟΠΩΤΕΡΟΝ
—a reading, which Robortelli says he found in all the manuscripts he consulted. I would only ask, whether Aristotle can be conceived to have written such a sentence as this?
"A fault in the Poetry itself is a more absurd thing than a fault in some other incidental matter; FOR it is a less fault,"
&c. Yet this, I think, is the plain English of the Greek—
Ἔτι, ἀτοπώτερόν ἐστι τὸ ἁμάρτημα τῶν κατὰ τὴν τέχνην, ἢ κατ’ ἄλλο συμβεβηκός· ἔλαττον ΓΑΡ κ. τ. λ.
Victorius contends strongly, and, I think, with much better reason, for
ποτέρων
. He says well—
"Nam quæ adjunguntur videntur significare ita prorsus legi debere: duo enim genera peccatorum contraria inter se indicant. Utrorum igitur peccatorum id, cujus arguitur poeta, videndum esse præcipit: alterum enim eorum genus faciliorem excusationem habet."
p. 274.

Commentary on the Poetics (Henry James Pye, 1792) (OCR draft) (Henry James Pye's 1792 English commentary, aligned to the Kassel reference edition.) focus

25.6. mvp-aristotle-comment-114 25.10

THE WORD MAY BE FOREIGN.

WE have already taken notice of the impoffibility of giving modern examples in serious compofition of this property of language, which confifted in transferring a word from one Grecian dialect to another. We may however illustrate in some degree this objection and its answer from what might happen in common difcourse. We will suppose a perfon to say, ، I would rather want my dinner than have it.' This is objected to as a contradiction. But the objector is answered, The • speaker is a Scotsiman, and to want, in the Scottish dialect, signifies simply to be without, and conveys no idea of wishing to possess, as it does in • English.' [P] This is fomething like the doctrine of Xenophanes, mentioned in this chapter. [2] For farther observations on this subject, see Note xvI. on this chapter. The
POETIC OF ARISTOTLE. The examples in the text are fufficiently clear; especially that of Dolon. Had he been deformed in body he could not have poffibly been so active as he is represented. The same objection may be made to the deformity of Richard 111. as he is described by Shakespear and the historians friendly to the house of Tudor; and goes far to justify the historic doubts of Walpole and (R) Buck. A modern general may command an army, however deficient in bodily strength and activity, provided he has good health. And an adımiral may command a fleet in an armed chair on the quarter deck; but a warrior with a withered arm and a distorted body, was ill calculated to turn the tide of battle in the wars between the houses of York and Lancaster; or to make the personal exertions Richard is said to have made in Bosworth-field.

Commentarius in Aristotelis Poeticam (Franciscus Ritter, 1839) (OCR draft) (Ritter's Latin commentary, extracted from the 1839 volume, divided by Ritter's chapters and sections, and linked to the corresponding Perseus reference subsections.) focus

5. mvp-aristotle-comment-188

Ritter, cap. 25 § 5

ὥστε δεῖ- λύειν: si reprehenduntur nonnulla in quodam artis poeticae opere a quaestionum subtilium captatoribus, ad diluendas reprehensiones quaerere convenit, utrum ars (poetica) ipsa peccaverit an peccatum ab alia arte acceptum propagaverit. quid excusationis et quando proferendum sit, ubi ars ipsa ἀδύνατα commiserit, continuo docet verbis πρῶτον μέν -Ἕκτορος δίωξις. τὸ γὰρ τέλος – ποιεῖ μέρος: respicit quae paulo ante (c. 24, 8) apud verum Aristotelem legit, unde perperam colligit epicae poesis finem esse ut admirationem faciat ( τὸ ἐκπλήττειν), id quod Aristoteles nusquam dixit neque dicere potuit. idem falsus auctor ex loco indicato exemplum illud suum sumpsit, sed tam obscure breviterque, ut hominem decet in exemplis unice versantem et nihil ultra exempla sapientem. — εἰ μέντοι τὸ τέλος - περὶ τούτων τέχνην: in his primum friget 5) Noli defendere falsum auctorem eiusmodi locis, qualis est in Topicis VI, 4 init. πρῶτον μὲν εἰ μὴ διὰ προτέρων καὶ γνωριμωτέρων πεποίηται τὸν ὁρισμόν.additum ἢ μᾶλλον ἢ ἧττον, tum subobscurum est quid sibi velint illa καὶ κατὰ τὴν περὶ τούτων τέχνην, quibus idem significari videtur quod modo monitum est, εἰ οὕτως ἐκπληκτικώτερον ἢ αὐτὸ ἢ ἄλλο ποιεῖ μέρος, h. e. si ne id quidem excusationis gratia dici potest, οὕτω ἐκπληκτικώτερον γίγνεσθαι ἢ αὐτὸ ἢ ἄλλο μέρος. nimirum technicus hic noster ubique artes loquitur. cf. Commentar. ad c. 20, 4. ἔτι ποτέρων - κακομιμήτως ἔγραψεν: alteram illam levioremque peccandi rationem interrogando et lectorem quasi excitando proponit, postquam priorem absolvit. si poeta κατὰ συμβεβηκός peccavit, illum peccasse quidem sed levius esse peccatum excusantes dicemus. illa ἔλαττον γὰρ – κακομιμήτως ἔγραψεν exempli gratia afferuntur. si quis cervae cornua tribuit (id quod et alii poetae fecerunt et Pindarus Ol. III, 29. vid. Boeckhii Explicationes ad h. 1.), is eam non κακομιμήτως γράφει, interpolatore quippe iudice: non enim quae sunt male describit ( κακομιμήτως γράφει), sed quae non sunt, eorum unum aliquid admisit, ut magis peccaverit in ἱστορίαν τῶν ζῴων quam in ipsam artem poeticam. hem astutias. similiter, ut poetae cornutas cervas producentes, Aristophanes peccavit, dum scribit in Nubibus 151. ἐνέβαψεν εἰς τὸν κηρὸν αὐτῆς (pulicis) τώ πόδε, ubi scholiasta: δυϊκὸν τὼ πόδε ἐπὶ τῆς ψύλλης κακῶς· λέγεται γὰρ ἓξ ἔχειν πόδας.