Poetics

You should read other books before reading poetics.

This is fantastic. It's a classic of philosophy and communication. I've been meaning to purchase this foe my home library for years and now I have it.

The book is in good condition.. it is a very dry read. It seems is more like a dry lecture opposed to a written work. It is interesting but you need a lot of understanding especially about famous writers of centuries ago to really understand this book.

Good for all types of readers

As the shortest book I've got on my literature student bookshelf, this Dover Thrift Edition Poetics is the cheapest, and most flimsy, but completely worthwhile book. There's no introduction to the book, just a note about when it was written (circa 330BC) and about Aristotle himself, taking up less than a page. The remaining 60 pages are left to Aristotle. It's not difficult to read, which was my initial concern. Another review says this translation is simplified, but I would say it's not over simplified- you still need to understand general poetic terms like 'anapaests or trochaic tetrameters' (p22) so don't feel like you need to look for a more academic, archaic, hard to read version. The content is so short, it's like an essay on how to spot the strengths and weaknesses in plays, and it's not generalised, it's specific- 'Tragedy endeavours, as far as possible, to confine itself to a single revolution of the sun' (p9), which in playwriting books I've read, it takes a whole chapter to say 'you're best off writing a play set within one day, it works better'. I'm just on my second reading, marking out the important parts I'll need to refer to in future. The paper is cheap and my ink pen goes straight through the paper, pencil doesn't show up well, so am using sticky paper to make notes. It's only short, and it's cheap, and I'd recommend you buy a cheap version rather than paying a lot of money for an introduction that's not needed, because it's not difficult to read.

No quality problem~