Form Form, in the history of philosophy, term used to translate the Greek words idea and eidos, referring

to a particular kind of entity which plays a prominent role in the philosophies of Plato and Aristotle. Platonic forms are eternally existent, immaterial entities; they exist apart from the ordinary objects of experience in the sensible world around us; and they are the objects of reason rather than perception. Uncontroversial examples of Platonic forms include ethical and aesthetic properties, such as justice and beauty; properties of si e, such as largeness and smallness; and geometrical properties, such as e!uality. "ertain passages in Plato suggest an extension of the range of forms to include all properties that are common to many things. #or Plato, forms are the proper object of philosophical in!uiry since they, unlike the instances of these properties we perceive in the world around us, provide a stable basis for knowledge. Perceptible objects that have these properties, such as beautiful paintings or large buildings, are said to derive their beauty or largeness from their relation to the corresponding forms$beauty or largeness. %hereas Platonic forms exist separately from the objects of ordinary experience, Aristotelian forms may be characterized as immanent & they do not exist over and above the objects which have them. 'he Aristotelian notion of form is tied to a correlative notion of matter. #or example, bricks are the matter of which a house is composed. (ut the bricks, taken by themselves, do not constitute a house; they do so only by taking on the form of a house. #or Aristotle, it is the form, more than the matter, which makes the house what it is; form constitutes the essence of the house as being a shelter for people and goods. )n the case of artefacts, the form of each may be thought of as a certain functional shape. #or Aristotle, however, the paradigm case of form is the form of a living thing, such as an animal or plant. 'his form is an internal dynamic principle which is causally responsible for the natural processes of development that the organism undergoes and which is reproduced in generation. Aristotle identifies the form of a living thing as its soul. Although the term *form+ is seldom used in modern philosophical discussion except in reference to Plato or Aristotle, their discussions of forms are the ancestors of much of the modern debate about universals, essence, and natural kinds, as well as of certain solutions to problems regarding the identity of objects over time. "ontributed (y& ,erity -arte !ssence "philosophy# ) ).'/01U"')0. 2ssence 3philosophy4, the property or properties an object must ha$e if it is to be what it is . )n addition, if being human is the essence of 5ocrates, it is then a necessary truth about 5ocrates that he is human. 'he thesis that objects have essences might be motivated as follows. )t seems plausible to suppose that an object might not have had some of the properties it actually has. #or example, 5ocrates might not have been executed by the Athenians in 677 bc; he might have died peacefully in his sleep a few years later. -owever, there seems to be a limit to the properties 5ocrates could have failed to have while remaining 5ocrates. 5uppose

one suggested that 5ocrates could have been a giraffe rather than a human being. At this point most people will agree that we have simply ceased to talk about a genuine possibility for the historical 5ocrates. 'he historical 5ocrates$that very individual$ could not have been anything other than human. -aving been human, therefore, unlike having been executed in 677 bc, is part of 5ocrates8s essence. %he essence of an object is often taken to constitute its identity, that is, what makes the object what it is . )ts essence may consist in membership of a natural kind, as in the claim that 5ocrates is essentially human. Alternatively, some have supposed that each object has a uni!ue individual essence. A special, but controversial, case of individual essence is called a *haecceity+, which is the property an object has of being that very object. "learly, if there are haecceities, they are properties an object could not have lacked. )) A/)5'0'92 A.1 90":2 #or Aristotle, the definition of something states its essence. A scientific understanding of something is achieved only once one has grasped its essence. Aristotle identifies an object8s essence with its substantial form& this is what makes the object what it is. #or Aristotle, an object8s essence is the kind of thing it is& so, the essence of 5ocrates is to be human; the essence of a house is to be a shelter for people and goods. 'he close connection evident in Aristotle8s thought between essence, definition, and the means by which we identify something as a member of a kind was challenged by ;ohn 9ocke. 9ocke distinguished between the *real essence+ of an object, which he identified as the internal constitution of its underlying parts, and its *nominal essence+. )ts nominal essence is the idea we have in our minds corresponding to the name of the object; this idea is a list, more or less complete, of its known sensible !ualities. 5ince the real essence of an object, according to 9ocke, is unknown to us, the criteria by which we identify an object are divorced from its underlying nature. ))) 2552."2 ). <0/2 /2"2.' P-)9050P-= )n recent philosophy, discussion of essence has concentrated on the !uestion of what kind of necessity is involved in the claim that an essential property is a property an object must have. %illard ,an 0rman >uine argued against essences, contending that what makes something necessary is not some feature of the object concerned, but rather some feature of the way we describe the object. #or example, the number nine may be referred to by the numeral *7+ or, since there are nine planets, by the phrase *the number of the planets+. -owever, while the sentence *7 is necessarily greater than seven+ is true, the sentence *the number of the planets is necessarily greater than seven+ is false, since there might have been fewer planets than seven. 'he necessity, >uine argues, is a function of the way we describe the object concerned. Against >uine, the American philosopher 5aul :ripke argued that the example turns on a feature of descriptions such as *the number of the planets+. :ripke calls such a description a *weak designator+& it does not designate the same object in all possible worlds, that is, in all possible conditions of the actual world. (y contrast, natural kind terms and proper names are *rigid designators+. #or example, the term *water+ designates a substance which is - ?0 in all possible worlds. %ater is thus necessarily -?0 and this fact is independent of the way we describe water. #or :ripke, therefore, natural kinds such as water have empirically discoverable essences. :ripke also argues

in defence of individual essences, which he ties to the necessity of something8s origins, for example, of an individual person8s having come from a particular fertili ed egg and sperm consisting of a particular set of atoms. <odern philosophical discussion of essence is embedded in discussion of a cluster of related problems& these concern modality, theories of naming and reference, natural kinds, and laws of nature. "ontributed (y&,erity -arte &ominalism .ominalism 39atin nominalis,+of or pertaining to names+4, in medieval scholastic philosophy, doctrine stating that abstractions, known as universals, are without essential or substantive reality, and that only individual objects have real existence. 'hese universals, such as *animal+, *nation+, *beauty+, and *circle+, were held to be mere names, hence the term *nominalism+. #or example, the name *circle+ is applied to things that are round and is thus a general designation; but no concrete identity with a separate essence of roundness exists corresponding to the name. 'he nominalistic doctrine is opposed to the philosophical theory called extreme realism, according to which universals have a real and independent existence prior to and apart from particular objects. .ominalism evolved from the thesis of Aristotle that all reality consists of individual things; the extreme theory of realism was first enunciated by Plato in his doctrine of universal archetypal ideas. 'he nominalist@realist controversy became prominent in the late AAth and A?th centuries, the nominalist position being expounded by /oscelin, and the realist by (ernard of "hartres and %illiam of "hampeaux, all advocates of scholasticism. 'he issue between nominalism and realism was not only philosophical but also theological, for /oscelin maintained that the 'rinity 3#ather, 5on, and -oly 5pirit4, conceived in the traditional theology of the "hurch as constituting a unity of one divine nature, cannot be understood, according to the individuali ing method of nominalism, except as three distinct and separate gods, a doctrine known as tritheism. 'he "hurch was therefore irreconcilably opposed to nominalism. 'he implications for ethics were also far@reaching. )f there is no common nature for all individuals, then there is no natural law that governs all people; actions are morally right or wrong only because they are commanded or forbidden by Bod. A theory intermediate between nominalism and realism is that of conceptualism, in which universals, although they have no real or substantive existence in the external world, do exist as ideas or concepts in the mind and are thus something more than mere names. Another alternative theory is moderate realism, which locates universals in the mind but also admits a real basis in particular objects. 'he defence of nominalism undertaken by the ACth@century 2nglish scholastic philosopher %illiam of 0ckham prepared the way for various modern nominalistic theories such as those of instrumentalism, pragmatism, semantics, and logical positivism. Genre "literature# ) ).'/01U"')0. Benre 3literature4, in literature, a category, kind, sort, or style of literary or artistic work.

)) 12#).)')0. 'he idea of genre is notoriously difficult to define, and mention of the term gives rise to two further !uestions of definition. #irst, what kinds of literary form should properly be called genresD Poetry, for instance, is now generally thought of as a literary *mode+, being too broad and too varied to be called a genre. 'he various types and forms of poetry are more properly called genres, for instance the epic or the lyric. 5econdly, when should a literary work be said to be of one genre and not anotherD (roadly speaking, there are two kinds of answer to this !uestion& a genre can be defined either by the formal properties of the work, or by its subject matter. 'hus, a poem is held to be a sonnet if it is AC lines long, while, on the other hand, it is described as an elegy if it speaks of the death of a loved or admired person. )n fact, though, neither form nor subject matter alone will usually be sufficient to define a genre. 5o, by convention, a sonnet is a poem about love; while the word *elegiac+ originally denoted not a concern with death, but a specific Breek poetic metre 3see ,ersification4. #or all these difficulties of definition, however, genre is among the most enduring of literary concepts, introduced by the Breek philosopher Aristotle and now enjoying yet another revival in contemporary literary criticism. )t reflects a deep urge, in writers and readers, to classify literary works, and it is the difficulty of performing such classification which has kept the term alive. ))) '-2 U525 0# B2./2 Artists choose to work in a particular genre for a variety of reasons. 'he simplest, and most obvious, is that they want to say something which has in general been expressed in a given form in the past. #or instance, *Adonais+ by Percy (ysshe 5helley is elegiac because the poet wanted to honour and lament the death of his friend, the poet ;ohn :eats, and such sentiments had always been expressed in the form of an elegy. 2legy, in fact, has proved a most enduring genre, and is a useful example of the way genres develop. %hen dealing with subjects as difficult to contemplate as death, writers inevitably look for models; and the more such models are used, the more the style in which previous writers have treated the subject hardens into a genre. As a result, it is hard, now, to think of speaking about death any other way than elegiacally. "ertain subjects therefore lend themselves to certain genres by association. A more complex reason for choosing to write in a particular genre is to signal some attitude to the past and to literary history$respect, perhaps, or antagonism. #or instance, writers sometimes stay faithful to the conventions of a particular genre in order to indicate respect for the tradition embodied in those conventions. Arthur <iller8s play 1eath of a 5alesman 3A7C74 honours and identifies with both the tragic tradition, especially as defined by Aristotle, and also those dramatists who have sustained that tradition. <ore specifically, a writer might use genre to acknowledge the importance of a particular predecessor. Alexander Pope deliberately wrote his <oral 2ssays after the style of -orace, thereby discharging the debt of influence he felt to the /oman poet. A slightly less generous reason for writing in a given genre can be the desire to emulate the past and previous writers 3an impulse which does, though, signal a measure of respect4. 'hus in the first book of 'he Prelude, %illiam %ordsworth asserts himself as <ilton8s e!ual, and so as a poet capable of epic. 0ther generic decisions signify a fondness for the past. 5o familiar, for instance, are the conventions of pastoral poetry that simply to mention them is to indicate nostalgia for a time when life was less

complicated. 'he idyll has a similar function. 2!ually the decision to use a new 3or long neglected4 genre is often rooted in an artist8s desire to distance himself or herself from a previous generation of artists. 'hus in the A7CEs the American poet /obert 9owell signalled his dislike for experimental writing by imitating the rigorously formal poetry of Berard <anley -opkins. A further and increasingly important reason an artist will work within the confines of a given genre is to establish a contract with the audience. 'his contract can be used by the artist to tell the audience how to interpret the work. 'hus, by a series of conventional signals 3such as props, dialogue, or production values4 the director of a ;ames (ond film lets his audience know that certain things are likely to happen, and, for instance, that the violence that ensues should not be taken too seriously. 'he artist can also use the generic contract to identify with his chosen audience. )n much the same way that gang members bond by the use of slang, so Alexander Pope used conventional satirical references to declare his aesthetic and political associations with the 5criblerus club and its admirers. %orking from within the same club ;onathan 5wift put the generic contract to more subversive use. -is A <odest Proposal 3AF?74 was written in the style of an economic treatise. )t was however, a parody, 5wift8s aim being first to attract readers of such works, and then to undermine the attitudes such works conventionally convey. #rom Aristotle to /oland (arthes, literary critics have shown great interest in genre. "ritics have asked different !uestions of genre than writers. 'hey have asked& what makes one genre different from another; whether some genres are intrinsically superior to others; why some genres 3biography, for instance4 have proved more enduring than at others; why some genres, like the epic, flourish at certain times and not at others; how new genres develop; how much generic integrity should be preserved; and what an interest in, or hostility towards, generic conventions tells us about a particular culture. ), "9A55)"A9 0/)B).5 0# B2./2 Aristotle was the first critic to dwell on !uestions of genre. -is Poetics applied the same attempt at classification to literature that he had developed in his writings on natural science. )n the opening statement of the Poetics he announces his intention to discuss not only the art of poetry in general, but also its *species and their respective capacities+. -e divides poetry into five categories$epic, tragedy, comedy, dithyrambic 3wild, hymn@like4 poetry, and flute@ and lyre@playing$and the majority of the Poetics is occupied with the task of differentiating between these species. #or Aristotle such species, or genres, differ according to their use of means 3rhythm, language, harmony4; their object 3tragedy, for instance treating noble characters, and comedy ignoble characters4; and the manner in which they recount events, whether by third@ or first@ person narration, or dramatically. "entral to the Poetics is the argument for a hierarchy of genres, Aristotle famously contending that tragedy was better, because less vulgar, than epic. -e was also the first critic to discuss generic development, describing how tragedy and comedy evolved out of epic and iambs 3low invectives4 respectively. <ost importantly perhaps, Aristotle develops the concept of *decorum+, by which he argues that certain forms are naturally suited to certain subjects. )t follows from this that writers are urged to stay within, and not to mix, generic conventions, the conventions reflecting *natural+ distinctions. <uch /oman discussion of genre took the form of handbooks on rhetoric, for instance )nstitutio 0ratoria 3'he 'raining of an 0rator, c. ad 7G4 by >uintilian and /hetorica ad

-erennium, believed to be by "icero, which described the forms orators should use to gain maximum rhetorical effect on any given occasion. )t was the poet -orace, however, who made the most substantial /oman contribution to genre studies, his Ars Poetica offering a subtle development of Aristotle8s rather dogmatic arguments. -orace provides a brief history of several genres$epic, elegiacs, iambics, and lyric poetry$and argues that the poet must appreciate the importance of generic difference. -owever, he also argues that it is sometimes necessary to invent new forms, as certain /oman writers had, though such forms, he insisted, must be self@consistent. , <)1192 AB25 '0 '-2 /2.A)55A."2 0n the whole, medieval writers and critics did not share this classical interest in genre, the ,enerable (ede, for instance, devoting only one paragraph of 1e Arte <etrica to the !uestion of genre. -owever, just as he developed the epic, the )talian poet 1ante also advanced generic theory. )n 1e ,ulgari 2lo!uentia he defended his decision to write 'he 1ivine "omedy in )talian rather than 9atin, and adapted the concept of decorum to establish which of the various )talian dialects was most suited to tragic, comic, and elegiac subject matter. 'hus the idea of genre was given a political twist, articulating the medieval )talian concern with regional and interstate politics. Perhaps the chief generic development of the period was the emergence out of the epic tradition of the romance, a popular form 3of which 5ir Bawain and the Breen :night is a key example4 which dealt with the conventions of courtly love. /enaissance theorists placed genre at the centre of literary criticism, holding to Aristotle8s criteria, but disputing his hierarchy. %illiam %ebbe8s A 1iscourse of 2nglish Poetry, Beorge Puttenham8s 'he Arte of 2nglish Poetry,An Apologie for Poetry by 5ir Philip 5idney, and a version of Ars Poetica by (en ;onson all turned on generic considerations. 'he 2nglish /enaissance attitude to genre is characteri ed by a flexibility that reflects the confidence of the period, no writer being more flexible than 5hakespeare. A generic approach to 5hakespeare would concentrate on his innovations to the sonnet form, his incorporation of genres within genres 3pastoral scenes in As =ou 9ike )t, and mas!ues in 'he 'empest4, and his shrewd mixing of generic elements 3for instance the painful moments of comedy in the otherwise tragic :ing 9ear4. 5hakespeare8s supreme confidence is apparent in his satirical treatment of Polonius, the ponderous counsellor in -amlet, for whom art is always a !uestion of categories& *tragedy, comedy, history, pastoral, pastoral@comical, historical@pastoral, tragical@ historical, tragical@comical@historical@pastoral+. %ritten some GE years after 5hakespeare8s death, and at the latter end of the 2nglish /enaissance, the epic poem Paradise 9ost, by ;ohn <ilton, is a different example of the period8s generic confidence. 'he epic is an expression of cultural strength, and is thus a genre to which few writers have been able to aspire. "ertainly <ilton8s poem acts as a summation of the new /enaissance learning. ,) AUBU5'A.5 '0 /0<A.')"5 %riters of the Augustan 3or .eo@"lassical4 period in (ritish literary history were preoccupied, not to say obsessed, with the re!uirements of genre. 0f 1ramatick Poesy, an 2ssay 3AHHI4 by ;ohn 1ryden, A 1iscourse upon "omedy by Beorge #ar!uhar, An 2ssay on the 'heater by 0liver Boldsmith, and, most importantly, the 2ssay on "riticism 3AFAA4 by Alexander Pope all asserted the value of generic integrity. Pope argued, like -orace, for the notion of decorum, contending, in his 2ssay, that generic forms were not devised but discovered in nature. As with 1ryden, Pope8s respect for generic forms arose from his reverence for classical learning, but such reverence itself re!uires some

explanation. Unable to match the energies of the /enaissance, the Augustans had to look to another tradition to find a distinctive way of writing in 2nglish. 2!ually, however, the .eo@"lassical passion for genre was intended by the Augustans to signal a commitment to the values enshrined in classical forms, and a distaste for the corruptions of their own 3increasingly decadent4 society. 'hus, Pope8s mock@epic 'he /ape of the 9ock mocked not epic, but a 9ondon society he felt unworthy of epic treatment. )t typified the contemporary vogue for satire. Augustan decorum is sometimes aligned with 2nlightenment philosophy, since both seem to share a desire to find order in nature, as, for example, in the .eo@"lassical essay 0f 'ragedy by the philosopher 1avid -ume. -owever, genre, philosophy, and history rarely stand in easy relation to one another, and so even while 2nlightenment thinking was insisting on the desirability of universal order and the power of reason, generic innovations of the period articulated an awareness of change and a fascination with irrationality. 'he novel was the major new genre of the AIth century and it marked a willingness to embrace contemporary socio@economic reality 3shown by writers like 1aniel 1efoe and -enry #ielding to be far from ordered4 which !uite reversed the .eo@ "lassical impulse. 5o rapidly did the novel develop that it soon became the literary mode most attractive to generic innovation. 'he Bothic novel, which emerged in the AFHEs, was one such innovation, serving as an outlet for readers8 unenlightened fascination with the mysterious and the supernatural. "ommitted to individualism and originality, /omantic writers and theorists were, as a rule, actively hostile to the conventions and restraints of genre. 5ymptomatic of this hostility was the omission by %illiam %ordsworth of any mention of generic re!uirements in his Preface to 9yrical (allads 3AF7I4. )n fact, %ordsworth8s poetry was not as free of generic considerations as he liked to pretend. -is decision to use the popular genre of the ballad marked his opposition to the over@elaborate poetry he found around him, and constitutes one of the most important generic gestures in (ritish poetic history. Benerally though, the explicit resistance to genre found in books such as 2dward =oung8s "onjectures on 0riginal "omposition anticipates the dominant /omantic line on the !uestion, traceable through ,orlesungen Jber die Aesthetik by -egel, Uber 2pische und 1ramatische 1ichtung by Boethe, and the Preface to 0des et (allades 3AI?H4 by ,ictor -ugo. ,)) ,)"'0/)A.5 '0 <012/.5 'he major genre@related concerns for ,ictorian aesthetic theorists were historical. 'hus %alter Pater in Plato and Platonism 3AI764, ;ohn Addington 5ymonds 3in 0n the Application of 2volutionary Principles to Art and 9iterature4, and <atthew Arnold 3in the Preface to <erope, AIGI4 all sought not to define genres, or place them in a hierarchy, but to explain how they evolved and why some genres flourished in some circumstances and not others. 'his approach was modern both in its use of 1arwinian terms, and its belief in the possibility of explaining everything with reference to history. -owever, mixed with this modern thinking was a fear of the increasing complexity of A7th@century life. (oth Pater8s title and Arnold8s mark a nostalgia for a more simple way of life 3the classical life4, and this nostalgia is reflected in the genres of the period. 'hus, Alfred 9ord 'ennyson sought refuge in Arthurian romance and that most conventionally nostalgic of forms, the idyll, while in the novel one major development was the emergence of the detective story, a genre in which an individual blessed with special powers negotiates a tremendously complex se!uence of events, finally to arrive at a

solution which everyone can grasp. 'he detective story has gained popularity in the ?Eth century for these same reasons. 'he ?Eth century has witnessed an explosion of both critical and creative styles, and nothing like a consensus can be said to have emerged on the !uestion of genre. )t can be argued, however, that genre provides as good a means of negotiating the differences as any other aesthetic notion. "ertainly the term could be used to chart the critical and theoretical history of the period. #or the /ussian #ormalists, for instance, genre was important insofar as they sought to understand artistic works through their dominant element, which was their genre. 0ne of the #ormalists8 major innovations was to carry this critical practice into the study of popular 3or *low+4 forms such as the fairy tale, thus paving the way for modern cultural studies and the fascination with the soap opera. ;an <ukarovsky 3'he %ord and ,erbal Art4 was a major exponent of this kind of criticism. )n his Anatomy of "riticism 3A7GF4, "anadian literary critic .orthrop #rye combined the study of genres with ;ungian analysis arguing that the major genres were rooted in archetypal forms of thought. Benre was of central importance to structuralists like ' vetan 'odorov 3'he #antastic& A 5tructural Approach to Benre4 who argued that a literary work was to be read in relation to the systems from which it emerged. Post@structuralists, on the other hand, have had it both ways& /oland (arthes suggesting that a text has no meaning beyond the generic codes by which it functions; while for ;ac!ues 1errida the category of genre is too self@ contradictory to be sustainable. )t is e!ually difficult to say anything general about the ?Eth century8s cultural products, except that with the advent of mass communication this period has been more conscious than ever of a divide between high and low culture. 'he highest art of the century has been produced in the name of <odernism, and the <odernists 3;oyce, 2liot, and Pound, for example4 tended to hold generic convention in disdain, believing, like the /omantics, in the value of originality, though they called it novelty. 'his anti@generic impulse resulted in such individual gestures as, in art, Abstract 2xpressionist painting. =et if the ?Eth century has seen great aesthetic experimentalism, it has also given rise to an e!ually powerful cultural conservatism, since the appeal of popular forms in various media 3like the detective story, science fiction, the thriller, the situation comedy, and the soap opera4 lies in the very familiarity of their generic conventions. ,))) B2./2 ). '-2 P05'<012/. AB2 'he literary critic -arold (loom argues that what defines the Postmodern period 3A7GE to the present4 is its feeling of lateness, its feeling that everything of value has already been said. )n anxious periods such as this 3the .eo@"lassical period was perhaps another4, artists inevitably become preoccupied with genre, devoting their energies to considerations of artistic form, not subject matter. Art of all kinds thus tends to become either more allusive or more parodic. 'he witty and highly allusive films of >uentin 'arantino are perhaps the inevitable product of such an age& sometimes honouring previous works, sometimes parodying them, but always and everywhere showing their knowledge of genre. 'he generic character of the Postmodern period can also be found in its popular music, which must always fulfil the conventions of a particular form, be it rap, garage, techno, dub, gangster@rap, Acid@ja , or (rit@pop.