Analysis of Ars Poetica, part 1

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Horace in ‘The Ars Poetica’ says that although poets and painters are given equal license for invention but it does not mean that like a painter, a poet will mix any thing and everything. He gives example by saying that how would one feel if he sees a beautiful maiden having a fish tail or the head of a male with the body of a horse or limbs of different beasts having all sorts of feathers of the birds. Surely a person will consider the painter to be mad. He says that an artist must avoid the mixing of such extremes as mentioned by the poet. Liberty of invention does not mean that he would couple savages with tame, serpents with birds or lambs with tigers.

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