"Eikós" nella "Poetica" di Aristotele

Xavier Riu

Abstract:

The traditional interpretation of Aristotle's Poetics, largely still in force, is based on the assumption that mímesis refers to the relationship between poetry and reality external to it, and that this reality is the reality we know from everyday human life. The keyword that indicates this relation is eikós, interpreted as 'likely' or 'probable'. According to this interpretation, Aristotle saw poetry, and especially tragedy, as a likely reflection of human reality, but uses of eikós in other Aristotelian works do not confirm this view of the word. This paper examines these uses and proposes translations, then applying them to an interpretation of Aristotle's notion of mímesis in the Poetics.