20
In the others the choral odes have no more to do with the plot than with any other tragedy. And so they sing interludes, a practice begun by Agathon. And yet to sing interludes is quite as bad as transferring a whole speech or scene from one play to another.
1
The other factors have been already discussed. It remains to speak of Diction and Thought.
2
All that concerns Thought may be left to the treatise on Rhetoric, for the subject is more proper to that inquiry.Thought—no English word exactly corresponds with διάνοια—is all that which is expressed or effected by the words (cf. Aristot. Poet. 6.22, 23, and 25). Thus the student is rightly referred to the Art of Rhetoric, where he learns what to say in every case. Aristotle adds that the rules there given for the use of ideas will guide him also in the use of incidents, since the same effect may be produced either by talk or by situation.
3
Under the head of Thought come all the effects to be produced by the language.
4
Some of these are proof and refutation, the arousing of feelings like pity, fear, anger, and so on, and then again exaggeration and depreciation.It is an important part of the orator’s skill to depreciate what is important and to exaggerate trivial points.
5
It is clear that in the case of the incidents, too, one should work on the same principles, when effects of pity or terror or exaggeration or probability have to be produced.
6
There is just this difference, that some effects must be clear without explanation,Those produced by situation. whereas others are produced in the speeches by the speaker and are due to the speeches. For what would be the use of a speaker, if the required effect were likely to be felt without the aid of the speeches?
