《诗学诗艺》章节试读

《诗学诗艺》的笔记-第34页 - 第十三章

我们的怜悯之心，是由于感觉某人遭受了不应遭受的灾难而产生；恐惧的产生，是由于这些遭受灾难的人与我们自己很相似。

《诗学诗艺》的笔记-第89页 - 诗艺

“如果我没有能力和技巧遵照这些明确的规定和诗的格律，我有什么理由叫做诗人？为什么要因为一种虚伪的自尊心，我宁肯保持无知也不去学习这些技巧？”

《诗学诗艺》的笔记-第59页 - 诗的用词

我用推理来解释隐喻，当第二个词与第一个词的关系，就像第四个词与第三个词的关系一样的时候，可以用第四个词代替第二个词，或用第二个词代替第四个词。有时候，人们给隐喻词加上一个限定词，可以更适合被代替的词。例如，酒杯对于狄奥尼索斯，就像盾牌对于阿瑞斯，因此，可以把酒杯称为狄奥尼索斯的盾牌，把盾牌称作是阿瑞斯的酒杯。又如，老年对于生命，就像黄昏对于白天，因此，可以把黄昏叫做白日的老年，或者像恩培多克勒那样称呼它，可以把老年称作生命的黄昏，或生命的夕阳。有时候，类比词之间没有相同的名字，但同样可以使用隐喻词，例如，撒玉米种子叫做播撒，而太阳撒光线却没有名称，但播撒玉米与太阳播撒阳光是同样的关系，因此，可以这样表达：“散播它的神造的光芒。”
这种隐喻词还有另一种用法，借用别的事物的名字，称呼这一事物，同时又否定了它的一个属性。例如，不把盾称为是阿瑞斯的杯，而称为无酒之杯。

《诗学诗艺》的笔记-第88页 - 诗艺

无论他们是什么，人类的作品都将消亡。
不管这些语言有多么华丽优美，也不可能拥有不朽的生命。……因为语言的规则和习惯在变化。
好聪明。

《诗学诗艺》的笔记-第78页 - 第二十五章

一件不可能发生但具有可信性的事情，要比一件可能发生但不具有可信性的事情更好。尽管向宙克西斯所画的人物是不可能存在的，但是，这样比他们存在更好，因为理想形式的美应该是更卓越的美。
这样幻想不好么

《诗学诗艺》的笔记-第86页 - 《诗艺》全部摘录整理

1，不论你做什么，你必须一心一意，始终把注意力放在要点上。
2，我的朋友们，我们有许多诗人被引入歧途，听信了“拼命工作”的观点。我尽最大努力想写的简短，可写出来却很晦涩。我追求平易，却发现我正在失去激情和能量。一个诗人想要写出宏伟的诗篇，而结果却变成了臃肿浮夸。另一种情况是过于小心，不敢张开翅膀，他也就永远不会离开地面。还有一些人，把一个普通事物的单调主题变幻出各式花样，比如，在树林里面画一个海豚，在海浪中画一头野猪。一个人如果不懂得艺术，他为了避免小错误，反而会导致严重的缺陷。
3，如果你们想成为作家，就要选择力所能及的主题，认真考虑什么题材是你能够承担得起来的，哪些超过了你的能力范围。
4，我认为，有序的优点和魅力，在于在任何时候，诗人都能说出他的诗在那一刻要求他说的话，而把不需要说的观点后置一段时间，或者把它们放到一边，从而显示出他的绝妙思想，而把其他的撇开。
5，我们都要死亡，我们和我们所有的艺术。
6，喜剧的主题不能用悲剧的形式去表达。
7，不同的角色说话有很大差异。
8，不管是遵循已有的道路，还是新创造出一些东西，都要求作品自身要一致。
9，只要你不把时间浪费在陈腐的问题上，你就能够用一个熟悉的主题写出你自己的特性。
10，他总是很快地进入关键环节，把听众带到故事之中，好像他们对故事已经很熟悉。他认为，如果通过他的处理不能增加效果，那么他就会放弃这部分。他将虚实结合在一起，做得非常巧妙，非常有创造性，开端和中间，中间和结尾都没有出现矛盾的情形。
11，刚学说话和刚学会稳当走路的小孩，喜欢和他一样大的儿童在一起玩，他们很容易就会彼此生气，而一个很小的理由也就会让他们又重新和好，他们的情绪每个小时都在变化。嘴上没毛的年轻人，摆脱了父母的管教，玩弄起狗和马来，他们在马提尤斯校园长满绿草的运动场上尽情嬉戏。他像一块融化的蜡那么柔顺，容易被引上邪恶的道路，而对师长的劝告，却不肯接受，懒得为将来的需求做准备。他们浪费钱财，欲望无度，而又喜新厌旧。到了成年，当他在年龄和思想上都成熟的时候，他的兴趣发生了改变，他开始追求有钱和有势的社会关系，瞄准稳定的政府职位，做事小心谨慎，避免做出那些叫人后悔的事情。到了老年会被很多痛苦所困扰，他要设法挣钱，而又很难挣到钱，所以，就害怕花钱；他无论做什么事情，都担惊受怕，拖延失望，迟钝无能，贪图长生不死。他也顽固不化，脾气暴躁，他骄傲地讲起他年轻时候的故事，批评指责晚辈们。岁月的增加，给他们带来了很多好处，但人的生命在衰落，岁月也带走了许多活力。所以，不要把青年写成个老人的性格，也不要把儿童写成成年人的性格——我们应该始终把不同的年龄和特性恰当的配合起来。
12，有许多情节不必呈现在观众眼前，而是让一个口才动人的讲述着来描述。
13，讲笑话和愚弄酒色之徒能够赢得观众的喝彩。把一个严肃的事情变成轻松愉快的事情，一定要用这样的方式来表达：任何人都不能作为天神和英雄出现，他们刚刚穿着华丽的服装，进入黑暗的小屋，说一些街巷俚语，或者滔滔不绝地说些虚无缥缈的话，试图超越粗俗。悲剧不屑于描述那些琐事。
14，词语必须放在正确的位置，处于正确的关系之间，才能发挥出力量。
15，我亲爱的伙伴，纳马庞皮留思的后人，没有任何一首诗歌不是经过长时间的修剪才能型，经过许多次的涂改才能把最细微的细节都打磨正确。
16，如果你找到了主题，语言文字也就随之而至。
17，诗人的目标是给人益处和乐趣，或者是给人快感和对生活有用的一些规则。
18，一首诗就像一幅画：有的是离你越近，给你的印象越深，而有的要从远一点的距离看才好；有的要求放在黑暗的角落里，有的应该放在光线充足的地方来观赏，能够经得住鉴赏家那双敏锐眼睛的审视；有的只能看一遍，有的百看不厌。
19，不要忘记：生活中的事物只有一部分存在第二条通道。
20，没有发表的东西，你能够销毁；而话一旦出口，可就收不回来了。
21，区分公私权利，区分神圣与亵渎，禁止淫乱，制定婚姻生活的规则，建立邦国，明示法律。
22，神的预言是通过歌声传达的，诗歌也教给人们正确的生活方式。
23，假意奉承的人比真正赞美你的人表现出更多的欣赏。
24，一个诚实有判断力的人，对毫无生气的诗句，一定会提出批评；对粗糙的诗句，一定能够发现它的错误；在任何不雅的地方，他会用笔画出来。对那些多余的装饰，他会删去；那些含义模糊的地方，他会让你说清楚，让你注意到你明确的地方。
25，诗人应该有自我毁灭的权利。去救一个不想得救的人，这无异于杀了他。

《诗学诗艺》的笔记-第47页 - 第十七章

一个自己处于激情中的人，能够制造出最真实的激动和愤怒。因此，诗是伟大天才的产物，也是“病人”的事业；一个是非常机敏的人，另一个是“疯子”。。

《诗学诗艺》的笔记-第25页 - 第九章

诗人的职责已经很清楚，他不是去描述那些发生过的事情，而是去描述那些可能发生的事情，也就是在一定条件下可能发生或者必然发生的事情。……因此，诗比历史更富于哲学性，更值得认真关注。因为诗所描述得是普遍性的事实，而历史讲述的是个人事件。有时候我就想，我能想到的所有可能性都是发生过的。

《诗学诗艺》的笔记-第89页

如果我没有能力和技巧遵照这些明确的规定和诗的格律，我有什么理由还叫做诗人？为什么因为一种虚伪的自尊心，我宁肯保持无知而不去学习这些技巧？
前半句，现代诗已经向其发出挑战；后半句，倒是很具有普遍性

《诗学诗艺》的笔记-第87页

如果一个人选择的主题在他的能力范围之内，他就不会出现表达不畅的问题，他的思想也可以清晰而条理分明地呈现出来。我认为，有序的优点和魅力，在于在任何时候，诗人都能说出他的诗在那一刻要求他说的话，而把不需要说的观点后置一段时间，或者把它们放到一边，从而显示出他的绝妙思想，而把其他的撇开。

《诗学诗艺》的笔记-第1页 - 诗学

诗是伟大天才的产物，也是＂病人＂的事业；一个是非常机敏的人，另一个是＂疯子＂

《诗学诗艺》的笔记-第7页 - 第二章

悲剧和喜剧也有同样的差别；因为喜剧的目标是把人描述得比我们今天的人更坏，而悲剧则是把人描述得比我们今天的人更好。更坏所以滑稽，更好所以他的毁灭性更悲哀么

《诗学诗艺》的笔记-第1页

Introduction
Epic and tragic poetry, comedy too, dithyrambic poetry, and most music composed for the flute and the lyre, can all be described in general terms as forms of imitation or representation. However, they differ from one another in three respects: either in using different media for the representation, or in representing them in entirely different ways.
1 One should not be called a poet for sake of meter alone, which alas is the tendency in Aristotle’s time, but for his capability of imitation.
“Yet Homer and Empedocles have nothing in common except their metre,and therefore, while it is right to call the one a poet, the other should rather be called a natural philosopher than a poet.”
2 This is the difference that marks the distinction between comedy and tragedy; for comedy aims at presenting men as worse than they are nowadays, tragedy as better.
3 For it is possible, using the same medium, to represemt the same subjects in a variety of ways.
Thus in one sense Sophocles might be called an imitator of the same kind as Homer, for they both represent good men; in another sense he is like Aristophanes, in that they both represent men in action, men actually doing things.
Certain Dorians of the Peloponnese lay claim also to poetry. They regard the names as proof of their belief, pointing out that, whereas the Athenians call outlying villages demoi, they themselves call them komai,so that comedians take their names, not from komazein, ‘to revel’, but from their touring in the komai when lack of appreciation drove them from the city. Furthermore., their word for ‘to do’ is dran, whereas the Athenian word is prattein.
4 The origins and development of poetry
The creation of poetry generally is due to two causes, the instinct for imitation and a feeling for music, rhythm. Metres are obviously detached sections of rhythm.
But just as Homer was the supreme poet in the serious style, standing alone both in excellence of composition and in the dramatic quality of his representations of life, so also, in the dramatic character that he imparted, not to invective, but to his treatment of the ridiculous, he was the first to indicate the forms that comedy was to assume; for his Margites bears the same relationship to our comedies as his Iliad and Odyssey bear to our tragedies. When tragedy appeared, those whose natural aptitude inclined them towards the one kind of poetry wrote comedies instead of lampoons, and those who were drawn to the other wrote tragedies instead of epics; for these new forms were both grander and more highly regarded than the earlier.
Both tragedy and comedy had their first beginnings in improvisation. The one originated with those who led the dithyramb, the other with the leaders of the phallic songs which still survive today as traditional institutions in many of our cities. Aeschylus was the first to increase the number of actors from one to two, cut fown the role of the chorus, and give the first place to the dialogue. Sophocles introduced three actors and painted scenery. As for the grandeur of tragedy, it was not until late that it acquired its characteristic stateliness, when, progressing beyond the methods of satiric drama, it discarded slight plots and comic diction, and its metre changed from the trochaic tetrameter to the iambic. At first the poet had used the tetrameter because they were writing satyr-poetry, which was more closely related to the dance; but once dialogue had been introduced, by its very nature it hit upon the right measure, for the iambic is of all measures the one best suited to speech.This is shown by the fact that we most usually drop into iambics in our conversation with one another, whereas we seldom talk in hexameter, and then only when we depart from the normal tone of conversation.
5 epic compared with tragedy
1 They differ, however, in that epic keeps to a single metre and is in narrative form.
2 length. Tragedy tries as far as possible to keep within a single revolution of the sun, or only slightly to exceed it, whereas the epic observes no limits in its time of action-although at first the practice in this respect was the same in tragedies as in epics. All the elements of epic are found in trgedy, though not everything that belongs to tragedy is to be found in epic.
6 In tragedy it is action that is imitated, and this action is brought about by agents who necessatily display certain distinctive qualities both of character and of thought, according to which we also define the nature of the actions. Thought and character are, then, the two natural causes of actions, and it is on them that all men depend for success or failure. The representation of the action is the plot of the tragedy; for the ordered arrangement of the incidents is what I mean by plot.
Necessarily, then. Every tragedy has six constituents, which will determine its quality. They are plot, character, diction, thought, spectacle, and song. Of these elements the most important is the plot, the ordering of the incidents; for tragedy is a representation, not of men, but of action and life, of happiness and unhappiness—and happiness are bound up with action. …that the two most important means by which tragedy plays on our feelings, that is, ‘ reversals’ and ‘recognitions’ , are both constituents of the plot.
7 I have already laid down that tragedy is the representation of an action that is complete and whole and of a certain amplitude---for a thing may be whole and yet lack amplitude. Now a whole is that which has a beginning, a middle and an end.
Furthermore, whatever is beautiful, whether it be a living creature or an object made up of various parts, must necessarily not only have its parts properly ordered, but also be of an appropriate size, for beauty is bound up with size and order.
Now in just the same way as living creatures and organisms compounded of many parts must be of a reasonable size, so that they can be easily taken in by the eye, so too plots must be of a reasonable length, so that they may be easily held in the memory. The limits in length to be observed, in as far as they concern performance on the stage, have nothing to do with the dramatic art; for if a hundred tragedies had to be performed in the dramatic contests, they would be regulated in length by the water-clock, as indeed it is said they were at one time. With regard to the limit set by the nature of the action, the longer the story is the more beautiful it will be, provided that it is quite clear. To give a simple definition, a length which, as a matter either of probability or of necessity, allows of a change from misery to happiness or from happiness to misery is the proper limit of length to be observed.
8 Unity of plot important for my own use!! Similar to Poe’s theory
A plot does not possess unity, as some people suppose, merely because it is about one man.
In writing his Odyssey he did not put in everything that happened to Odysseus, that he was wounded on Mount Parnassus, for example, or that he feigned madness a the time of the call to arms, for it was not a matter of necessity or probability that either of these incidents should have led to the other; on the contrary, he constructed the Odyssey round a single action of the kind I have spoken of, and he did this with Iliad too. Thus, just as in the other imitative arts each individual representation is the representation of a single object, so too the plot of a play, being the representation of an action, must present it as a unified whole; and its various incidents mustbe so arranged that if any one of them is differently placed or taken away the effect of wholeness will be seriously disrupted. For if the presence or effect of wholeness will be seriously disrupted. For if the presence or absence of something makes no apparent difference, it is no real part of the whole.
9 It will be clear from what I have said that it is not the poet’s function to describe what has actually happened, but the kinds of thing that might happen, that is , that could happen because they are, in the circumstances, either probable or necessary. The differences between historian and the poet is not that the one writes in prose and the other in verse; the work of Herodotus might be put into verse, and in this metrical form it would be no less a kind of history than it is without metre. The difference is that the one tells of what has happened, the other of the kinds of things that might happen. For this reason poetry is something more philosophical and more worthy of serious attention than history; for while poetry is concerned with universal truths, history treats of particular facts.
By universal truths are to be understood the kinds of thing a certain type of person will probably or necessarily say or do in a given situation; and this is the aim of poetry, although it gives individual names to its characters.
By now this distinction has become clear where comedy is concerned, for comic poets build up their plots out of probable occurances, and then add any names that occur to them; they do not, like the iambic poets, write about actual people. In tragedy, on the other hand, the authors keep to the names of real people, the reason being that what is possible is credible. Whereas we cannot be certain of the possibility of something that has not happened, what has happened is obviously possible, for it would not have happened if this had not been so.
What I have said makes it obvious that the poet must be a maker of plots rather than of verses, since he is a poet by virtue of his representation, and what he represents is actions. And even if he writes about things that have actually happened, that does not make him any the less a poet, for there is nothing to prevent some of the things that have happened from being in accordance with the laws of possibility and probability, and thus he will be a poet in writing about them.
Of simple plots and actions those that are episodic are the worst. By an episodic plot I mean one in which the sequence of the episodes is neither probable nor necessary.
However, tragedy is the representation not only of a complete action, but also of incidents that awaken fear and pity, and effects of this kind are heightened when things happen unexpectedly as well as logically, for then they will be more remarkable than if they seem merely mechanical or accidental.
10A complex action is one in which the change is accompanied by a discovery or a reversal, or both.
12 The prologue is the whole of that part of a tragedy that precedes the parode, or first entry of the Chorus. An episode is the whole of that part of a tragedy that comes between complete choral songs. The exode is the whole of that part of a tragedy which is not followed by a song of the Chorus. In the choral sections the parode is the whole of the first utterance of the Chorus, and a stasimon is a choral song without anapaests or trochees. A ‘commos’ is a passage of lament in which both Chorus and actors take part.
13 …for our pity is awakened by undeserved misfortune, and our fear by that of someone just like ourselves----pity for the undeserving sufferer and fear for the man like ourselves
Inevitably, then, the well-conceived plot will have a single interest, and not, as some say, a double. The change in fortune will be, not from misery to properity, but the reverse, from prosperity to misery, and it will be due, not to depravity, but to some great error either in such a man as I have described or in one better than this ,but not worse.
Euripides, faulty as is his management of other points, is nevertheless regarded as the most tragic of our dramatic poets.
14 Fear and pity may be excited by means of spectacle; but they can also take their rise from the very structure of the action, which is the preferable method and the mark of a better dramatic poet.
Now if a man injures his enemy, there is nothing pitiable either in his act or his intention, except in so far as suffering is inflicted; nor is there if they are indifferent to each other. But when the sufferings involve those who are near and dear to one another, when for example brother kills brother, son father, mother son, or son mother, or if such a deed is contemplated, or something else of the kind is actually done, then we have a situation of the kind to be aimed at.
15 In characterization there are four things to aim at. First and foremost, the characters should be good. ..In the second place the portrayal should be appropriate. For example, a character may possess manly qualities, but it is not appropriate that a female character should be given manliness or cleverness.
Thirdly, the characters should be lifelike…And fourthly, they should be consistent. 16 Of all the forms of discovery, the best is that which is brought about by the incidents themselves, when the startling disclosure results from events that are probable, as happens in Sophocles’s Oedipus, and again in the Iphigenia—for it was quite probable that she should wish to send off a letter.
17 In putting together his plots and working out the kind of speech to go with them, the poet should as far as possible keep the scene before his eye.
As far as possible, too, the dramatic poet should carry out the appropriate gestures as he composes his speeches, for of writers with equal abilities those who can actually make themselves feel the relevant emotions will be the most convincing-agitation or rage will be most vividly reproduced by one who is himself agitated or in a passion. Hence poetry is the product either of a man of great natural ability or of one not wholly sane; the one is highly responsive, the other possessed.
As for the stories, whether he is taking over something ready-made or inventing for himself, the poet should first plan in general outline, and then expand by working out appropriate episodes.
18 Every tragedy has its complication and its denouement.
There are four kinds of tragedy, a number corresponding to that of the constituent parts that I spoke about. There is complex tragedy, which depends entirely on reversal and discovery; tragedy of suffering, as in the various plays on Ajax or Ixion; tragedy of character, as in The Phthiotides and the Peleus; and fourthly, spectacular tragedy, as in The Phorcides, in the Prometheus, and in the plays with scenes in Hades.
20 Language in general is made up of the following parts: the letter, the syllable, the connecting word, the article, the noun, the verb, the inflexion or case, and the phrase or proposition.
A verb is a composite of sounds with a meaning; it is concerned with time, and as was the case with nouns, none of its individual parts has a meaning in its own right. The words ‘man’ and ’white’ give no indication of time, but ‘walks’ and ‘has walked’ indicate respectively present and past time.
21 I explain metaphor by analogy as what may happen when of four things the second stands in the same relationship to the first as the fourth to the third; for then one many speak of the fourth instead of the second, and the second instead of the fourth. And sometimes people will add to the metaphor a qualification appropriate to the term which has been replaced. Thus, for example, a cup stands in the same relationship to Dionysus’s shield and the shield Ares’s cup. Or again, old age is to life as evening is to day, and so one may call the evening the old age of the day, or name it as Empedocles named it; and one may call old age the evening of life or the sunset of life.
22 The greatest virtue of diction is to be clear without being commonplace. The clearest diction is that which consisted of words in everyday use, but it is commonplace, as can be ssen in the poetry of Cleophon and Sthenelus.
This is the one thing that cannot be learnt from anyone else, and it is the mark of great natural ability, for the ability to use metaphor well implies a perception of resemblances.
24 Experience has shown that the heroic hexameter is the right meter for epic.
The marvelous should of course be represented in tragedy, but epic poetry, where the persons acting the story are not before our eyes, may include more of the inexplicable, which is the chief element in the marvelous. If it were brought to the stage there would be something ridiculous about the pursuit of Hector…The marvelous is a source of pleasure…The diction should be elaborated only in ‘neutral’ sections, that is, in passages where neither character nor thought is in question, for diction that is too brilliant may obscure the presentation of character and thought.
25 There are, then, five grounds on which a passage may be censured: that it is impossible , irrational, immoral, inconsistent, or technically at fault. And the answers are to be studied in the light of the twelve criteria that I have already enumerated.
26 in this chapter, Aristotle expressed his belief that tragedy is a better form of art than epic.

《诗学诗艺》的笔记-第35页 - 悲剧的行为

我们的怜悯之心，是由于感觉某人遭受了不应遭受的灾难而产生；恐惧的产生，是由于这些遭受灾难的人与我们自己很相似。

《诗学诗艺》的笔记-第106页 - 诗艺

诗人应该有自我毁灭的权利。
去救一个不想得救的人，这无异于杀了他。