Horace (65- 8 B.C.
)
Horace was the son of an energetic an ambitious freedman1. He
was educated at Rome, and then sent to Athens to study philosophy. He
was considered among the best Roman poets of his time. His Epistola ad
Pisones ( in the next century called Ars Poetica by Quintlian) was
written towards the end of his life.
In Horace's time, Roma ruled the world. It was a time when people
thought that things have settled once and for all. His letter to the Pisos,
called Art of Poetry became a handbook of critics who assume stability
both in taste and state. This is why Horace strikes us as conservative and
concerned too much with manners and practicality.
Horace is urbane, cultivated, and preachy. H advises poets to avoid
extremes and to thumb Greek masterpieces day and night. He warns poets
of the dangers of originality. Too much of it is dangerous.
The concept of imitation for Aristotle was an imitation of human
action; for Plato it was an imitation of Ideas. With Horace denotes
imitation of Greek writers.
Unlike Plato moral philosophy and Aristotle's theoretical insights.
Horace is not interested in fundamental problems of aesthetics. He is
merely interested in giving rules and asking poets to conform to
standards. This is one of the reasons why a recent critic has made the
following comment. " to modern students of critical theory, Horace's Art
of Poetry is more interesting for its important historical influence than for
its intrinsic value as criticism."
1
Freedman : an emancipated slave.
Roman society was acutely aware of its own paradoxes: the freedmen and slaves who served
the emperors became figures of exceptional power and influence to whom even the grandees
had to pay court.
Horace marks the didactic trend in criticism. He believes that the
poet should be a benefactor of society. The poet has a definite function :
it is both religious and moral.
One of the major concepts associated with Horace's "Decorum2".
What he means by that term is the rightness of each part to the whole. Or
if we want to make the definition less abstract, decorum means that
writing should be appropriate to subject-matter.
Horace's Ars Poetica is in the form of a poem, which is essentially
an advice to a young would-be poet whose name is Piso. The poem is
thus a purely practical treatise on how to excel in poetry and to avoid
certain pitfalls. The structure of the treatise follows the ancient theoretical
arrangement Poesis, Paema, Poeta( that is, the art of poetry, its form and
the maker of the poetry). The poem deals with many notions and ideas in
an informal manner. Some of these ideas are:
1. The poet should stick to one subject matter.
2. Subject should be suitable to the poet's talent and ability.
3. The poet should be careful in his use of words; he should avoid
new coinages as much as possible.
4. Language is subject to a process of continuous change, like
nature itself.
5. The poet should follow the style and tone appropriate to each
form of poetry, and also the meter suitable to each kind.
6. Poetry should be sincere; it should come from the heart of the
speaker directly.
2
Behaviour in keeping with good taste and propriety.
7. The poet should either follow tradition or invent a story that is
consistent.
8. Characters should behave according to their rank and age.
9. Study Greek drama day and night.
10. The poet should work hard to improve his product, exactly like
a craftsman.
Poetic Diction
Horace will be always remembered for his theory of poetic diction.
The function of language in poetry is to express man's experience that is
continually changing. With the growth of experience, the language of
poetry should keep pace. Language is like a tree and its words are like
leaves. As the years go on, the old leaves fall and new leaves take their
place; but the tree remains the same. Horace's observations on poetic
diction are like those of Aristotle. Following Aristotle, he also
emphasizes the right choice of words and their effective arrangement in
composition. A poet is free to use both familiar and new words. New
words continually go on coming to the poet like new leaves to the tree.
The poet must not rely wholly on the vocabulary of his predecessors, but
must coin new words too.
