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26-456: Ars Poetica may refer to: "Ars Poetica" (Horace) , a c. 19 BC poem by Horace "Ars Poetica" (Archibald MacLeish) , a 1926 poem by Archibald MacLeish Ars poetica (Israel) , an Israeli poetry collective "Ars Poetica" (Charents) , poem collection by Yeghishe Charents (Armenian poet) Topics referred to by the same term [REDACTED] This disambiguation page lists articles associated with

52-408: A bird, nor Cadmus into a snake. I shall turn in disgust from anything of this kind that you show me." In Renaissance Italy, important debates on decorum in theater were prompted by Sperone Speroni 's play Canace (portraying incest between a brother and sister) and Giovanni Battista Giraldi 's play Orbecche (involving patricide and cruel scenes of vengeance). In seventeenth-century France,

78-578: A more detailed summary of Horace's Ars Poetica , see the article on Horace's Epistles – Epistle II.3). According to Howatson, many of the phrases used by Horace in Ars Poetica "have passed into common literary parlance." Four quotations in particular associated with the work are: The work is also known for its discussion of the principle of decorum (the use of appropriate vocabulary and diction in each style of writing; l.81–106) and for Horace's criticisms of purple prose ( purpureus pannus , l.15–16),

104-512: A practical standpoint—as a craft, or ars —rather than the theoretical approach of his predecessors, philosophers Aristotle and Plato . He also holds the poet in high regard, as opposed, for instance, to Plato, who distrusts mimesis and who has philosopher Socrates say in Book 10 of the Republic that he would banish poets from the ideal state. The following is a brief outline of the main subjects of

130-525: A term coined by him to mean the use of flowery language. This principle is considered a core component of Horatian poetics as it principally aimed to achieve verisimilitude in artistic representation, guiding everything from the choice of genre to diction, dramatic characterization, meter, poetic invention, and the intended effect. Some cited that decorum enforces subordination such as of parts to whole, woman to man, desire to reason, and individual to state. In line 191, Horace warns against deus ex machina ,

156-523: Is not susceptible of treatment in a tragic style, and similarly the banquet of Thyestes cannot be fitly described in the strains of everyday life or in those that approach the tone of comedy. Let each of these styles be kept to the role properly allotted to it." Hellenistic and Latin rhetors divided style into the grand style , the middle style, and the low (or plain) style. Certain types of vocabulary and diction were considered appropriate for each stylistic register. A discussion of this division of styles

182-546: The Modernist movement , with the result that readers' expectations were no longer based on decorum, and in consequence the violations of decorum that underlie the wit of mock-heroic , of literary burlesque , and even a sense of bathos , were dulled in the twentieth-century reader. In continental European debates on theatre in the Renaissance and post-Renaissance, decorum concerns the appropriateness of certain actions or events to

208-563: The Horatian platitude. The Horatian platitude is usually given as "instruct and delight", but sometimes as "instruct or delight". The first reading implies that all literature must be instructive. A related ambiguity is that "instruct" might be better translated as "help", "advise", or "warn". Horace repeats this maxim in different wordings: " Aut prodesse uolunt aut delectare poetae aut simul et iucunda et idonea dicere uitae " ("The poet wishes to benefit or please, or to be pleasant and helpful at

234-504: The Renaissance the mixture of revived classical mythology and Christian subjects was also considered to fall under the heading of decorum, as was the trend of mixing religious subjects in art with lively genre painting or portraiture of the fashionable. The Catholic Council of Trent specifically forbade , among other things, the "indecorous" in religious art. Concepts of decorum, increasingly sensed as inhibitive and stultifying, were aggressively attacked and deconstructed by writers of

260-473: The arrival of Christianity , concepts of decorum became enmeshed with those of the sacred and profane in a different way than in the previous classical religions. Although in the Middle Ages religious subjects were often treated with broad humour in a "low" manner, especially in medieval drama , the churches policed carefully the treatment in more permanent art forms, insisting on a consistent "high style". By

286-457: The audience by their cruelty or unbelievable nature: "But you will not bring on to the stage anything that ought properly to be taking place behinds the scenes, and you will keep out of sight many episodes that are to be described later by the eloquent tongue of a narrator. Medea must not butcher her children in the presence of the audience, nor the monstrous Atreus cook his dish of human flesh within public view, nor Procne be metamorphosed into

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312-404: The courtroom, of the type of argument that is within bounds, remains pertinent: the decorum of argument was a frequent topic during the O.J. Simpson trial . During Model United Nations conferences the honorable chair may have to announce, "Decorum delegates!" if delegates are not adhering to parliamentary procedure dictated by the rules. This often happens if a delegate speaks out of turn or if

338-497: The fitness or otherwise of a style to a theatrical subject. The concept of decorum is also applied to prescribed limits of appropriate social behavior within set situations. In classical rhetoric and poetic theory, decorum designates the appropriateness of style to subject. Both Aristotle (in, for example, his Poetics ) and Horace (in his Ars Poetica ) discussed the importance of appropriate style in epic , tragedy , comedy , etc. Horace says, for example: "A comic subject

364-497: The importance of Horace's Ars Poetica ( Art of Poetry ) for the subsequent history of literary criticism. Since its composition in the first century BCE, this epigrammatic and sometimes enigmatic critical poem has exerted an almost continual influence over poets and literary critics alike – perhaps because its dicta, phrased in verse form, are so eminently quotable. Horace's injunction that poetry should both "instruct and delight" has been repeated so often that it has come to be known as

390-464: The mixing of styles within a work was considered inappropriate, and a consistent use of the high style was mandated for the epic. However, stylistic diversity had been a hallmark of classical epic (as seen in the inclusion of comic and/or erotic scenes in the epics of Virgil or Homer). Poetry, perhaps more than any other literary form, usually expressed words or phrases that were not current in ordinary conversation, characterized as poetic diction . With

416-484: The notion of decorum ( les bienséances ) was a key component of French classicism in both theater and the novel, as well as the visual arts. Social decorum sets down appropriate social behavior and propriety , and is thus linked to notions of courtesy , decency , etiquette , grace , manners , respect , and seemliness . The precepts of social decorum as we understand them, as the preservation of external decency, were consciously set by Lord Chesterfield , who

442-450: The original epistle are typically in the form of prose. "Written, like Horace's other epistles of this period, in a loose conversational frame, Ars Poetica consists of 476 lines containing nearly 30 maxims for young poets." But Ars Poetica is not a systematic treatise of theory, and it wasn't intended to be. It is an inviting and lively poetic letter, composed for friends who appreciate poetic literature. Horace approaches poetry from

468-490: The practice of resolving a convoluted plot by having an Olympian god appear and set things right. Horace writes " Nec deus intersit, nisi dignus vindice nodus ": "That a god not intervene, unless a knot show up that be worthy of such an untangler". Perhaps it can even be said that the quotability of Horace's Ars Poetica is what has given it a distinguished place in literary criticism. The Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism says: It would be impossible to overestimate

494-484: The same time"), " miscuit utile dulci " ("a mix of useful and sweet"), and " delectando pariterque monendo " ("delighting and advising"). The Ars Poetica was first translated into English in 1566 by Thomas Drant . A translation by Ben Jonson was published posthumously in 1640 . Decorum Decorum (from the Latin : "right, proper") was a principle of classical rhetoric , poetry, and theatrical theory concerning

520-410: The satyric type, verse-forms, and employment of Greek models (ll. 153–294). (c) A poet's qualifications include common sense, knowledge of character, adherence to high ideals, combination of the dulce with the utile, intellectual superiority, appreciation of the noble history and lofty mission of poetry, and above all a willingness to listen to and profit by impartial criticism (ll. 295–476). (For

546-442: The stage. In their emulation of classical models and of the theoretical works by Aristotle and Horace (including the notion of the " Three Unities "), certain subjects were deemed to be better left to narration. In Horace's Ars Poetica , the poet (in addition to speaking about appropriate vocabulary and diction, as discussed above) counseled playwrights to respect decorum by avoiding the portrayal, on stage, of scenes that would shock

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572-470: The title Ars Poetica . If an internal link led you here, you may wish to change the link to point directly to the intended article. Retrieved from " https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Ars_Poetica&oldid=1225614399 " Category : Disambiguation pages Hidden categories: Short description is different from Wikidata All article disambiguation pages All disambiguation pages Ars Poetica (Horace) The poem

598-492: The work: (a) A poem demands unity, to be secured by harmony and proportion, as well as a wise choice of subject and good diction . Meter and style must be appropriate to theme and to character. A good model will always be found in Homer (ll, 1–152). (b) Dramatic poetry calls for special care – as to character drawing, propriety of representation, length of a play, number of actors, use of the chorus and its music, special features for

624-879: Was looking for a translation of les moeurs : "Manners are too little, morals are too much." The word decorum survives in Chesterfield's severely reduced form as an element of etiquette: the prescribed limits of appropriate social behavior within a set situation. The use of this word in this sense is of the sixteenth-century, prescribing the boundaries established in drama and literature, used by Roger Ascham , The Scholemaster (1570) and echoed in Malvolio 's tirade in Twelfth Night , "My masters, are you mad, or what are you? Have you no wit, manners nor honesty, but to gabble like tinkers at this time of night?... Is there no respect of persons, place nor time in you?" The place of decorum in

650-468: Was set out in the pseudo- Ciceronian Rhetorica ad Herennium . Modeled on Virgil 's three-part literary career ( Bucolics , Georgics , Aeneid ), ancient, medieval, and Renaissance theorists often linked each style to a specific genre : epic (high style), didactic (middle style), and pastoral (plain style). In the Middle Ages, this concept was called "Virgil's wheel". For stylistic purists,

676-576: Was written in hexameter verse as an Epistle (or Letter) to Lucius Calpurnius Piso (the Roman senator and consul) and his two sons, and is sometimes referred to as the Epistula ad Pisones , or "Epistle to the Pisos". The first mention of its name as the "Ars Poetica" was c. 95 by the classical literary critic Quintilian in his Institutio Oratoria , and since then it has been known by that name. The translations of

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