Page 32 - DENG501_LITERARY_CRITICISM_AND_THEORIES

Literary Criticism and Theories

Notes The thought of the characters is expressed through their speeches, and hence the intimate relation
between thought and diction. Diction is the objectification of Thought, the vehicle through which
Thought finds expression.
There are three ways in which thought—the intellectual element—expresses itself:
1. Proof and Refutation: Thought expresses itself in the arguments which the characters use to
prove or disprove something. They may try to establish their own point of view or refute the
arguments advanced by the other characters.
2. Production of emotional effects: Today we tend of separate thought and emotion, but for the
classics emotion was a mode of persuasion, and hence could be considered as a variety of
thought. The speaker may introduce into his speech a variety of emotions in order to persuade
and convince. “Thought, then, is present both in speeches that involve reasoning and in speeches
intended to reveal the emotions of the speaker”—(O.B. Hardison).
3. Indications of the importance or significance of anything: By this statement Aristotle means
that thought is also expressed in speeches which are intended to exaggerate or diminish the
importance of anything. Through their speeches the characters may make something look
more noble and significant, or more trivial and base than it really is.
Thought appears in the speeches the dramatist composes, speeches which are appropriate or
adapted to the particular circumstances and situations of the tragedy. It is the response of the
character concerned to these situations. It is the plot which primarily expresses this reaction, but
the effect of the plot is reinforced by the verbal expression of the thought of the characters. This is
the function of speech in tragedy.
The thought or intellectual element of a tragedy can best be understood by those who have a
knowledge of the art of rhetoric, and so Aristotle himself refers his readers to his Rhetoric.

Chs. XX, XXI, XXII: Diction and Style
Aristotle deals with Diction of Tragedy in detail in these three chapters. Much of it is highly
technical, and is based exclusively on Greek grammar, Syntax and usage. Moreover, the topic is
not so much a part of literary criticism as that of grammar. Hence we give below only a brief
resume of the significant aspects of Aristotle’s discussion.
Diction is the choice and arrangement of words and images in a literary composition. The words
which a poet uses, says Aristotle, may be divided into six kinds:
1. those current in ordinary speech;
2. foreign terms imported from other languages, or from dialect, like, “fey”, or, “ennui”; or
3. those which are metaphorical like, ‘cold-blooded’;
4. the ornamental periphrasis beloved of eighteenth century poet;
5. new coinages like, “jabberwock”, or, “the fairy mimbling-mambling in the garden”; and
6. forms not entirely invented, but modified by lengthening as in the case of ‘faery”, by shortening
as in, “sovran”, or by simple variation as, “corse”, for, “corpse”.
Now the poet’s style, Aristotle proceeds, should fulfil, above all, two conditions: “it must be clear
and it must not be mean”. If it uses only, “current”, words, it will be clear but mean, as Wordsworth
often is; if it uses only strange words, it will be not mean, but either obscure or jargon, like parts
of Sir Thomas Browne or Francis Thompson. Accordingly, “modified”, words, variant forms, are
useful as being neither mean nor obscure. Compounded words, he thinks, are best for the dithyamb
(full-dress lyric or ode), rare words suit epic; whereas metaphorical diction is best suited to the
iambic verse of drama. For this is the metre closest to the prose of ordinary life, as befits an
imitation of that life; and a poetic diction which is mainly metaphorical can similarly keep closest
to the language of ordinary life. “The gift for metaphor” adds Aristotle, “is the greatest of all. This
alone cannot be thought, but is a mark of natural genius; for it implies an inborn eye for likenesses.”
To the far-reaching truth of this last statement, disguised as usual in the simple, casual language
of Aristotle, criticism usually does little justice. It is not fully realized how much the art of poetry

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