Aristotle's Poetics

I've just reviewed (for Amazon.com) the new book by Michael Tierno titled Aristotle's Poetics for Screenwriters: Storytelling Secrets from the Greatest Mind in Western Civilization:

[4.5 stars]
The oft-stated maxim of dramatic storytelling, everyone who is anyone in screenwriting recites, is to read Aristotle's Poetics. The problem? The original work in Greek is not what one would call bedside reading; the English translations of the original are almost as bad.

So what is a budding screenwriter to do if, as suggested, he wanted to understand the underpinnings of drama without having to learn and understand ancient Greek and all the arcane references in the Poetics? Well, that budding screenwriter buys and reads the new book by Michael Tierno. It's small enough that it could be light reading; each of its 33 chapters are easily digestible, but be not fooled! It's filled with tremendous information that, if properly understood, will help a writer, any writer, tell a gripping story.

Some of the reasons I gave it a four-and-a-half star rating instead of the full five are the same as I would give the original Poetics: the language is staid and a little difficult to assimilate for the modern understanding. Tierno does a good job of interpretation, but even then, there are some hard bumps that will give the reader pause. Tierno also tries hard to tie all the chapters into a smooth narrative, but again, there are some bumps: I don't, for example, see why chapter 29 (The Non-Linear Soul of Quentin Tarantino) was added as it seems incongruous without useful information not already covered earlier.

The other star-reducing problem is the seeming out-of-context quotations from the Poetics that require close reading to see their appropriateness, although for the most part the author does a fine job of showing precisely that. It's just a slight impediment to the flow. Very slight.

That said, here's my recommendation to obtain the maximum benefit out of this book: read the Poetics first. After which, rely on Tierno to provide the necessary interpretation; a job, as I stated earlier that he does quite well.

In summary, this is a good book. With close reading, perhaps even re-reading, it is capable of energizing your stories in the way the original work by (as the tagline of the book says) The Greatest Mind in Western Civilization does. This book is definitely barely-hidden gold that is easy to pass over. That fact it's not too expensive or overly ponderous in tone only adds to the value. High recommendations.

Postscript: The book has the author's website on the back. As of the date of writing this review, it's just a placeholder. Perhaps if the author eventually gets around to putting something useful up, he'll receive the full five stars!

Yes, pretty good book.