aristotle

[lobelia321]

Just to add: I get such a fucking kick out of using Aristotle and Plato to understand slashy fanfic. The thing is: it works so beautifully! And it works both ways! It works for A and P because their ideas can be applied to a genre they'd never even dreamed of (which shows how well thought-out their ideas were), and it works for slash because it shows that as well as being a low-brow form of amateur porn it is also a fantastically complex form of writing (which shows that narrative is the same wherever it may be found).

Oh, and the sheer audacity of it! Delicious.

Btw, if you prefer showing to telling and if you believe that the distinction show vs tell makes sense, you are an Aristotelian. Because he valued drama over poetry because it is all show.

But if you prefer telling to showing and believe that the narrator's presence should breathe life into the narrative, then you are a Platonist (is that the word?). Because he believed in the superiority over diegesis (narration) over mimesis (imitation), and rewrote the beginning of Homer's 'Iliad' (which is written in the first person) in third-person indirect reporting. But, note also, Plato believed mimesis was only possible in direct speech (dialogue) so his distinction diegesis / mimesis doesn't totally correspond to tell / show.

I have not yet figured out which one I am tho' my LJ appellation would appear to suggest I have. I love Plato's validation of diegesis (note my earlier anti-show-not-tell post!) but I also love Aristotle and at the moment, I've forgotten why. (It might just be because his name sounds so beautiful but then, I wouldn't be that superficial, would I?)

*giggles with glee*

Comments

[brightest-blue.livejournal.com]

We love Aristotle because he is cool. It's too late in the day to think of any better reason. And his view was probably quite popular at the time, in that everyone was so enamoured of Drama, tragedy, oh Aeschylus and Sophocles and woe woe WOE!

Is there such a word as Platonist? Because Platonic obviously has come to have a different meaning, at least for us (or no meaning at all, if one is a slasher). I always thought of poor Plato being nearly completely subsumed by Socrates, so much so that anything Plato wrote was actually Socratic? But perhaps his ideas regarding mimesis in relation to direct speech had more to do with the way stories were told at the time. Was there even such a thing as novels and short stories? Or was it all more or less oral? *cough* Or when put in writing, stories tended to be in play or dialogue form?

[lobelia321.livejournal.com]

*giggles*

Well, no, no novels or short stories. But then again, yesterday I saw a book in the library with the title *The Ancient Novel* so who the f knows? Aristotle distinguishes between epic and drama, as far as I remember. And Socratic: I like that, that sounds good. Eep, and you know more about this than I do evidently because my knowledge of the textual relationship of Socrates to Plato is totally underdeveloped.

[brightest-blue.livejournal.com]

Well, I don't know nearly enough about it. It's just that I recall every single thing of Plato's I've ever read is more or less just quoting Socrates and his cohorts. Although who knows how much of it was Plato's own thoughts. Perhaps he and Socrates had such a meeting of the minds that there was no point in making a distinction. Ah, brain-slash! This makes me think though, that I MUST reread some of the Greek tragedies. Gods, muses, heroes, that's all I want to fill my head with these days. :)

[lobelia321.livejournal.com]

Plato? Socrates? Were they contemporaries?

[brightest-blue.livejournal.com]

Yes, Socrates was a friend of the family, so it's supposed that Plato knew him from an early age. Plato also unsuccessfully tried to defend Socrates at his trial for heresy/treason?- or some variation of those two- and after his execution left Athens for quite a few years, rather disillusioned with democracy. I think this calls for some rather angsty slash. :)

[lobelia321.livejournal.com]

O my gods, classics rps!

Is Socrates the one with the hemlock?

[brightest-blue.livejournal.com]

Yes, Socrates was the hemlock-imbiber. Poor guy.

[lobelia321.livejournal.com]

This is *so* angst-slashy!

[brightest-blue.livejournal.com]

Oh great- now you have me thinking about philosopher-slash. Too bad these two weren't prettier. Yes, I know I'm superficial. *g* Apparently, though neither one was much to look at, they were hero-worshipped, adored, and occasionally propositioned by their lovely young students (who I'm sure at the least, were slashy with each other). *sigh* So many ancient Greeks, so little time.

[lobelia321.livejournal.com]

What's looks? The dyed-in-the-wool irredeemable slasher needeth not the pretty! And first-person pov is always a nice way to get rid of at least one necessity for pretty. Leaving angsting over desiring the ugly.

Endless possibilities!!

[brightest-blue.livejournal.com]

Are you saying I'm dyed-in-the-wool AND irredeemable? Although in light of recent LJ discussions about the affairs we apparently are all having with each others' brains, this might be easier than I thought!

[lobelia321.livejournal.com]

the affairs we apparently are all having with each others' brains,

What have I missed out on???!!!

[brightest-blue.livejournal.com]

OMG! Hold on, hold on *scrambles* You missed it all over the weekend.
here it is: http://www.livejournal.com/users/hesychasm/74060.html

[lobelia321.livejournal.com]

Wow! Don't have time to read it all right now (1,234 tigs?) but it sounds *fascinating*. Did you know this woman before now? I think I've heard of Jintian (context?) but not of hesychasm. Have friended her now.

[brightest-blue.livejournal.com]

Yikes, 1,234 tigs? When I last read, there were about 15 very long responses. [Bad username or site: @ livejournal.com] linked me to the post; I hadn't heard of her before.

[lobelia321.livejournal.com]

P.S. Not to forget that it's not what you have but what you do with it. ;-p