Sir Philip Sidney wrote An Apology for Poetry (or, The Defence of Poetry) in 1581, and it was

published in 1595, after his death.

Sidney wrote the Apology before 1583. It is generally believed that he was at least partly
motivated by Stephen Gosson, a former playwright who dedicated his attack on the English stage,
The School of Abuse, to Sidney in 1579, but Sidney primarily addresses more general objections
to poetry, such as those of Plato. In his essay, Sidney integrates a number of classical and Italian
precepts on fiction. The essence of his defense is that poetry, by combining the liveliness of
history with the ethical focus of philosophy, is more effective than either history or philosophy in
rousing its readers to virtue. The work also offers important comments on Edmund Spenser and
the Elizabethan stage.

Influence

Sir Philip Sidney’s influence can be seen throughout the subsequent history of English literary
criticism. One of the most important examples is in the work of the poet and critic, Percy Bysshe
Shelley. Shelley’s modern argument for poetry is cast in a Romantic strain in his critical work
titled A Defence of Poetry. In 1858, William Stigant, a Cambridge-educated translator, poet and
essayist, writes in his essay "Sir Philip Sidney"[1] that Shelley's "beautifully written Defence of
Poetry" is a work which "analyses the very inner essence of poetry and the reason of its existence,
- its development from, and operation on, the mind of man" (Garrett 347). Shelley writes in
Defence that while "ethical science arranges the elements which poetry has created," and leads to
a moral civil life, poetry acts in a way that "awakens and enlarges the mind itself by rendering it
the receptacle of a thousand unapprehended combinations of thought" (Shelley, Norton 517).

Sidney’s influence on future writers could also be analyzed from the standpoint of his handling of
the utilitarian viewpoint. The utilitarian view of rhetoric can be traced from Sophists, Joseph
Justus Scaliger, Petrus Ramus and humanists to Sidney (Bear 11). For instance, Sidney, following
Aristotle, writes that praxis (human action) is tantamount to gnosis (knowledge). Men drawn to
music, astronomy, philosophy and so forth all direct themselves to "the highest end of the
mistress knowledge, by the Greeks called architectonike" (literally, "of or for a master builder"),"
which stands, according to Sidney, "in the knowledge of a man's self, in the ethic and political
consideration, with the end of well doing and not of well knowing only" (Leitch "Sidney" 333).
Sidney’s program of literary reform concerns the connection between art and virtue (Mitsi 6).
One of the themes of the Apology is the insufficiency of simply presenting virtue as a precept; the
poet must move men to virtuous action (Craig 123). Poetry can lead to virtuous action. Action
relates to experience. From Sidney, the utilitarian view of rhetoric can be traced to Coleridge's
criticism, and for instance, to the reaction to the Enlightenment (Bear 11). Coleridge's brief
treatise On Poesy or Art sets forth a theory of imitation which bears a remarkable resemblance to
that of Sidney (Mack 131).

The contemporary impact of Sidney’s Apology is largely derivative of the humanistic precepts
that inform the work, and its linkage of the rhetorical with the civic virtue of prudence. Prudence
offers a middle ground between two extremes. Prudence, as a virtue, places a greater value on
praxis than gnosis (Harvey 1). Action is thus more important than abstract knowledge. It deals
with the question of how to combine stability with innovation (Jasinski 466).

Sidney’s influence on future critics and poets relates more closely to his view of the place of
poets in society. Sidney describes poetry as creating a separate reality (Harvey 3). The Romantic
notion, as seen in Wordsworth, is that poetry privileges perception, imagination and modes of
understanding. Wordsworth seeks to go back to nature for moments recollected in tranquility.
Sidney, like Shelley and Wordsworth, sees the poet as being separate from society. To Sidney the
poet is not tied to any subjection. He saw art as equivalent to "skill," a profession to be learned or
developed, and nature as the objective, empirical world (Kimbrough 44). The poet can invent, and
thus in effect grows another nature.

Sidney writes that there “is no art delivered to mankind that hath not the works of nature for his
principal object” (Leitch, Sidney 330). The poet then does not depart from external nature. His
works are "imitation" or "fiction," made of the materials of nature, and are shaped by the artist's
vision. This vision is one that demands the reader's awareness of the art of imitation created
through the "maker," the poet (Kimbrough 45). Sidney's notion of "fore-conceit" means that a
conception of the work must exist in the poet's mind before it is written (Harvey 3). Free from the
limitations of nature, and independent from nature, poetry is capable of "making things either
better than Nature bringeth forth, or, quite anew, forms such as never were in Nature" (Leitch
Sidney 330).

Sidney’s doctrine presents the poet as creator. The poet’s mediating role between two worlds –
transcendent forms and historical actuality – corresponds to the Neoplatonic doctrine of
emanation. A complement to this doctrine is the concept of return or catharsis, which finds a
parallel in Sidney’s contemplation of virtue, based on man’s rational desire (Craig 117). Apology
contains only elements of Neoplatonism without adhering to the full doctrine.

Thirdly, Sidney implies a theory of metaphoric language in his work. A recurring motif in
Apology is painting or “portraiture” (Leitch 333). Apology applies language use in a way
suggestive of what is known in modern literary theory as semiotics. His central premise is that
poetry is an art of imitation, that is a “representing, counterfeiting, or figuring forth” not unlike a
“speaking picture” (Leitch, Sidney 331). Sidney pays his homage to Aristotle. Yet he develops his
own idea of metaphoric language, one that it is based on an analogy through universal
correspondences. Sidney’s humanist poetics and his tendency to harmonize disparate extremes –
to seek mediation – find expression in poetic works by John Donne (Knauss 1).

The life and writings of Sir Philip Sidney remain a legacy. In 1819, Thomas Campbell concludes
that Sidney's life was "poetry in action," and then in 1858 William Stigant wrote that "Sidney's
real poem was his life, and his teaching was his example" (quoted in Garrett, Sidney 55). Sidney,
the man, is apparent everywhere in his works: a study of Sidney's works is a study of the man
(Kimbrough, "Preface" 1).

Significance

An Apology for Poetry is the most important contribution to Renaissance literary theory. Sidney
advocates a place for poetry within the framework of an aristocratic state, while showing concern
for both literary and national identity (Griffiths 5). Sidney responds in Apology to an emerging
antipathy to poetry as expressed in Stephen Gosson’s The Schoole of Abuse (1579). Gosson offers
what is in essence a puritan attack on imaginative literature (Griffiths 5). What is at stake in
Sidney’s argument is a defense of poetry’s nobility. The significance of the nobility of poetry is its
power to move readers to virtuous action (Robertson 657). True poets must teach and delight – a
view that dates back to Horace. s In an era of antipathy to poetry and puritanical belief in the
corruption engendered by literature, Sidney’s defense was a significant contribution to the genre
of literary criticism. It was England’s first philosophical defense in which he describes poetry’s
ancient and indispensable place in society, its mimetic nature, and its ethical function (Harvey 2).
Among Sidney’s gifts to his contemporaries were his respect for tradition and willingness to
experiment (Robertson 656). An example of the latter is his approach to Plato. He reconfigures
Plato’s argument against poets by saying poets are “the least liar” (Leitch 348). Poets never claim
to know the truth, nor “make circles around your imagination,” nor rely on authority (Letich 349).
As an expression of a cultural attitude descending from Aristotle, Sidney, when stating that the
poet "never affirmeth," makes the claim that all statements in literature are hypothetical or
pseudo-statements (Frye 35). Sidney, as a traditionalist, however, gives attention to drama in
contradistinction to poetry. Drama, writes Sidney, is “observing neither rules of honest civility nor
of skillful poetry” and thus cannot do justice to this genre (Leitch 356).

In Sidney's day anti-theatricality, an aesthetic and ideological concern, flourished among Sidney’s
circle at court (Acheson 11). Theatre became a contentious issue in part because of the
culmination of a growing contempt for the values of the emergent consumer culture. An
expanding money economy encouraged social mobility. Europe, at this time, had its first
encounter with inflation (Davies 517). London's theatres at that time grew in popularity so much
that by 1605, despite the introduction of charges, London commercial theatres could
accommodate up to eight thousand men and women (Hale 278). Sidney had his own views on
drama. In Apology, he shows opposition to the current of his day that pays little attention to unity
of place in drama (Bear 11), but more specifically, his concern is with the "manner" that the
"matter" is conveyed (Leitch Sidney 357). He explains that tragedy is not bound to history or the
narrative but to "laws of poesy," having "liberty, either to feign a quite new matter, or to frame the
history to the most most tragical conveniency" (357).

Sidney employs a number of strategies to assert the proper place of poetry. For instance, he
argues against the way in which poetry was misaligned with youth, the effeminate and the
timorous. He does so by introducing the idea that “poetry is the companion of camps” and by
invoking the heroes of ages past (Leitch 351). Sidney’s reverence for the poet as soldier is
significant because he himself was a soldier at one time. Poetry, in Apology, becomes an art that
requires the noble stirring of courage (Pask 7).

Sidney writes An Apology for Poetry in the form of a judicial oration for the defense, and thus it
is like a trial in structure. Crucial to his defense is the descriptive discourse and the idea that
poetry creates a separate reality (Harvey 2). Sidney employs forensic rhetoric as a tool to make
the argument that poetry not only conveys a separate reality, but that it has a long and venerable
history, and it does not lie. It is defensible in its own right as a means to move readers to virtuous
action.

Sidney's method

Censorship is one issue Sidney had to overcome through his use of rhetorical devices in the
Apology. Sidney was also versed in the phenomenon of courtiership. As part of his strategy
against the threat of censorship, Sidney uses the structure of classical oration with its
conventional divisions such as exordium and peroratio. Sidney's use of classical oration stems
from his humanist education (Harvey 1). He uses this method to build his argument, by making
use of the rhetorical methods in such guides as Thomas Wilson’s Arte of Rhetorique (1553)
(Harvey 2). Sidney also uses metaphor and allegory, to conceal and reveal his position. For
instance, his use of horsemanship as imagery and analogy substantiates his vision of the
transformational power of poetry. Sidney, as author, enters his work undetected in that the
etymology of his name “Philip” is “horse-lover” (Pask 7). From the opening discourse on
horsemanship, Sidney expands on the horse and saddle metaphor throughout his work by the
“enlarging of a conceit” (Leitch 333). It is Sidney who then guards against a falling out with the
“poet-whippers” (Leitch 346). Sidney also attends to the rhetorical concept of memory. Poetry,
apart from its ability to delight, has an affinity with memory (Leitch 347).

Method and style are thus key components of the Apology to overcome the problem of
censorship. For this reason, Sidney consciously defends fiction, and he attacks the privilege that
is accorded to “fact.” He argues that the poet makes no literal claims of truth, is under no
illusions, and thus creates statements that are in a sense “fictional” and as true as any others (Bear
5). What is at stake then is not only the value of poetry in the sense of its utility, but also its place
in a world replete with strife, the contingent and the provisional.