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Character is that which reveals choiceπροαίρεσις is a technical term in Aristotle’s ethics, corresponding to our use of the term Will, the deliberate adoption of any course of conduct or line of action. It is a man’s will or choice in the sense that determines the goodness or badness of his character. If character is to be revealed in drama, a man must be shown in the exercise of his will, choosing between one line of conduct and another, and he must be placed in circumstances in wbich the choice is not obvious, i.e., circumstances in which everybody’s choice would not be the same. The choice of death rather than disbonourable wealth reveals character; the choice of a nectarine rather than a turnip does not., shows what sort of thing a man chooses or avoids in circumstances where the choice is not obvious, so those speeches convey no character in which there is nothing whatever which the speaker chooses or avoids.
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Thought you find in speeches which contain an argument that something is or is not, or a general expression of opinion.
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The fourth of the literary elements is the language. By this I mean, as we said above, the expression of meaning in words,This seems to be a mistaken reference to 6 above where diction is defined as the metrical arrangement of the words. In poetry they come to the same thing. and this is essentially the same in verse and in prose.
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Of the other elements which enrichSee Aristot. Poet. 6.2. tragedy the most important is song-making.
