The Poetics has informed thinking about drama ever since. Aristotle explains how the most effective tragedies rely on complication and resolution, recognition and reversals. Taking examples from the plays of Aeschylus, Sophocles and Euripides, the Poetics introduced into literary criticism such central concepts as mimesis ('imitation'), hamartia ('error') and katharsis ('purification'). Richard Jankos acclaimed translation of Aristotles Poetics is accompanied by the most comprehensive commentary available in English that does not presume knowledge of the original Greek. In his near-contemporary account of classical Greek tragedy, Aristotle examines the dramatic elements of plot, character, language and spectacle that combine to produce pity and fear in the audience, and asks why we derive pleasure from this apparently painful process. One of the most powerful, perceptive and influential works of criticism in Western literary history
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