In the essay Retorica by Muckelbauer, he is able to bring up three distinct styles of imitation. Anywhere from reproducing a work of art, to even pulling away from the ideas of published writers and creating works through personal thought, these all make up the different styles and methods of imitation. Muckelbauer first creates an understanding the uses and differences that are distinguishable in any type of writing on any subject. The topic of love became the central aspect of imitation because love is a feeling and emotion that all individuals are able to express physically and emotionally. The several works of poets and writers from different backgrounds can take a stance on romance, ultimately bringing out truth to an individual viewpoint. Either way, the style of imitating through reproduction is seen as a way to pick up the grammatical and physical pattern of a sentence, although this is a model of imitation, there is a downside that Muckelbauer addresses and that is, the writer reproducing another work of writing in the same exact way, there is no conscious connection between the context of the original writer and the one reproducing the sentence, where the meaning is completely destroyed.
The second style of imitation follows the line of reproducing the works of a published writer, but gives variation for the student’s own thoughts and style that can be incorporated with the imitation. Poets normally fall under this category, where the interpretation of the world can be seen differently from person to person. The two main goals that are mentioned in the essay is that poetry and poets in general, are there to entertain and teach the general public directly. The actions humans take against one another can be perceived differently, but with the different perspectives, this can be seen as a probable action that is taken on from a series of events. The point that poets and others, who follow the style of imitation through variation, find it best to think and write about the abstract concepts that can be interpreted based on the perspective of others.
Then there is the last style of imitation where the distinction between repetition and variation becomes completely discarded for both the published writer and the individual imitating the piece. In the third and final movement of imitation using inspiration, the writer eventually becomes lost with themselves, because being able to create a stronger meaning that Muckelbauer describes as, mythical, an idea that is highly unobtainable. The idea of inspiration has hold true for individuals because the ideas introduced are seen past the original works of writing of several well-known philosophers.
With the different movements of imitation, Muckelbauer finds that all three can be used in different situation of literature, philosophers, and rhetoric. Although all three movements have distinct ways of imitation, there is no true conclusion as to whether or not one movement is better than the other; there are only more questions that follow with the concept of imitation.
Posted by dover94 on October 21, 2008
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