The Ontological Foundations of Aristotle’s Poetics

Abstract

The paper reconsiders Aristotle's Poetics as an integral part of his ontological and teleological philosophy rather than as an isolated aesthetic text. It argues that the principles of unity, causality, and necessity in tragic composition reflect the same conceptual framework that governs natural processes in Aristotle's thought. In this perspective, praxis—action whose end lies in itself—embodies within drama the fulfillment of telos, while mimesis and katharsis may be understood, beyond their traditional medical and cognitive interpretations, as artistic counterparts of nature's movement from potentiality to actuality. Tragedy thus emerges as a mode of ontological disclosure: through imitation it reveals the inner logic of structured action. By situating the Poetics within this broader framework, the study seeks to restore its philosophical dimension and to clarify the continuity between Aristotle's metaphysics and his theory of art.