“The Poetics”as Apology for Poetry and Poets

摘要

Plato and Aristotle are both great philosophers in Greek, and Plato is the teacher of Aristotle. But their attitudes to the philosophy and art are quite different from each other. In Plato’s point of view, all poets should be rebelled out of his republic as they will lead the ordinary people to a wrong way; but to Aristotle, poets and the poetry they write should be admired because they will make good effects on the people and the society. This paper is going to discuss about their different attitudes to the so⁃cial function of the poetry in three aspects: the content and the effect of the poetry; the nature of poetry.