wrote itdown); if it indicates a completely different text on poetry, then
that other text is lost. An answer to this riddle is as distant as an answer
to the riddle of catharsis.
Third, there are a number of related interpretative problems, which,
given the sparse language of thePoetics, we are unlikely to solve with any
satisfaction. As things stand, then, we lack a solid foundation on which to
build an account of catharsis. I shall give some brief examples. First,
Aristotle tells us that tragedy produces the catharsis of‘pity and fear’.
Some have taken it as obvious that‘pity and fear’stand in for a range of
emotions, including perhaps sorrow, shame, anger and so on.^47 Others
argue that, if Aristotle had meant to include those emotions, he would
have done so.^48 If catharsis is something that happens only to pity and
fear (but not, say, to sorrow or anger), then it’s highly specific and our
account of it will follow suit. Thus, it would be worth analysing what
Aristotle thought about pity and fear (including what he writes about
them in theRhetoric).^49 But if‘pity and fear’just head up a long list, then
an investigation into Aristotle on pity and fear (only) would be of limited
help to us.^50 Second, there is the question of how catharsis relates to
pleasure. Aristotle speaks of the characteristic pleasure of tragedy (without
saying what it is);^51 and he (elsewhere, not in thePoetics) associates cath-
arsis with pleasure.^52 Does this mean that tragic catharsis is the char-
acteristic pleasure of tragedy? Most assume that it is–hence its central
place in the definition of tragedy; others have argued that it is not,
because Aristotle mentions several kinds of pleasure that may be related
to tragedy.^53 A further and related problem, which we shall come to, is the
question of who is meant to experience catharsis. Is it (1) all spectators
(2) only the most virtuous spectators (3) not all and not the most virtuous?
Finally, there is a question that we touched on in relation tomimesis:to
what extent is thePoeticsin general, andcatharsisin particular, intended
to be Aristotle’s response to Plato’s complaints about the effect that
theatre has on the emotions?^54 How we answer any of these interpretative
questions reflects on how we answer the others, leaving us with no safe
starting point. For example, ifcatharsisis just for pity and fear, then it
looks less convincing as a response to Plato, who was concerned with the
effects of theatre onallthe emotions.^55
All of which might be thought sufficient to forget about the problem
of catharsis altogether. Why should we devote an enormous amount of
time and energy to a problem that, even if solved, would tell us what one
Macedonian thought was the function of one kind of (now virtually
unknowable) theatre approximately two and a half millennia ago and that
will, in any case, never actually be solved? When put this way, it’s hardly
surprising that plenty of people think that we shouldn’t and that the
extensive critical interest in catharsis has been dismissed by one critic as
150 From the Stage to the World