Different Styles of Imitation Essay

In The Transmission of Knowledge by Juan Luis Vives, Vives describes his idea of straight-laced sham. His basic theory is that people be non innately born(p)(p) with skills of finesse or rhetoric and thitherfore, these skills argon obtained through the personation of some other skilled dodgeists or rhetoricians. This idea is par allel to those of Petrarch and Alberti.Petrarch and Vives twain say that suitable imitation should be analogous to the way a son resembles his father. Vives says A son is said to be like his father, not so ofttimes in that he recalls his features, his face and form, but because envisions to us his fathers manners, his disposition, his talk, his gait, his movements, and as it were his very life, which issues forth in his actions as he goes abroad, from the versed seat of the spirit, and shows his real self to us. (190) Petrarch says, equally, As soon as we converge the son, he recalls the father to us, although if we should measure every featu re we should pass off them all different.(199)The father to son resemblance is the basis of imitation to both these indites. They both study that a good writer should use imitation in a way where what they simulate resembles the original, but does it not duplicate it. For Petrarch and Vives, this muckle be get hold ofd by properly integrating reading with piece of music. They both think that by reading something and being able to digest it thoroughly, angiotensin converting enzyme chamberpot enamour the overall idea and feeling of what he read onto his flirt with writing. This creates a deep imitation, rather than write what a writer says in different words. twain authors use the father to son metaphor to show that imitation should be meaningful and evocative.Petrarch supplements this idea by claiming that reading should be an alterative to endure. As wholeness would in a sense invite the father through the son, one should similarly be able to experience the author a writer succeeds. To illustrate this he referrers to wandering and transport through protrude his plant life. Specifically, Petrarch interchanges writing with experience when he describes climbing Mont Ventroux. He says nevertheless nature is not overcome by a mans devices a corporeal thing cannot reach the heights by fall and, further, there I leaped in my winged thought from things corporeal to what is spiritual and addressed myself in words like these (39)The physical and spiritual are linked so closely together that they transport and overlap one other. According to Petrarch, characteristics like this are traits of a good imitator. Vives also relates to the lovable of imitation which interchanges the bodily action with spiritual. He describes an oration, which links actions with rhetoric. He says entirely these modern imitators regard not so much the mind of the speechmaker in his expression, as the outward appearance of his words and the external for of his entitle. (191) two writers believe that by interchanging techne which psyche, one can properly imitate and outstrip a deeper significance of what the writer is imitating.Although Petrarch and Vives share similar ideas, they also hold a contradictory belief Petrarch only imitates Cicero, while Vives believes that one should imitate several exercises to create a single work. Although Vives clearly states that Cicero is the outflank model for writing in the colloquial panache Caesar and Epistles of Cicero will come into the runner rank of conversational style, (192) he also states that one should comprise writing by mimicking several writers The to a greater extent models we seduce and the less likeness there is between them, the greater is the progress of eloquence. (190) Foremost, Petrarch is not writing in the conversational style, instead he using the plain style. Therefore, he should mimic another writer from the list Vives has specified. Also, Petrarch is only interested in imita ting one writer, Cicero. He defends the Ciceronian customs duty by writing only in Ciceros style. For this reason, Petrarch does not read other writers, like Dante, because he is afraid that he will become the product of what he reads, ideas and style.Instead he immerses himself in Ciceros style by reading his work in such abstruseness that he essentially writes in Ciceros style without knowing he is doing so. Vives respects Ciceros work, but he does not believe that Cicero is the best writer. Other than Vives belief that Petrarch should tolerate imitated several conversationalists, Vives also states that imitation of Ciceros work is useful and safe, but not of his style for if anyone cannot achieve advantage in the attempt he will degenerate into redundant, nerveless, vulgar and vulgar kind of writer. (191) Therefore, the difference between Vives and Petrarch is that Vives believes that one should imitate several writers and that Cicero is not the best writer. Further, he offe rs a list of writers which should be imitated when trying to achieve a certain style. Petrarch, on the other hand, writes in Ciceros style and believes that Cicero should be imitated while engaging in every kind of writing.Alberti was an author who was more like Vives in this sense. He also believed that one should insure all the things which would make something beautiful into one. For example, he says that all arts are linked to exposure somehow, and that all arts take from incorporate the skills associated with movie into their works The architect, if I am not mistaken, takes from the painter architraves, bases, capitals, columns, faades and other similar things. whole the smiths, sculptors, shops and guilds are governed by the rules and art of the painter. It is scarcely possible to find any superior art which is not concerned with word picture. so that some(prenominal) beauty is found can be said to be born of painting .(Book II) Furthermore, it was important to Alberti t o imitate the laws of nature, rather than nature itself. He pointed out that an architect should mimic the structure of reality and the geometry hidden in reality. bid Vives and Petrarch, Alberti joined the bodily with the spiritual to create the perfect art. But, he resembles Vives, in the sense that he believes that one should imitate several things to create one thing.One difference between Alberti and Vives is that Vives believes that one should start out imitating a person who is not the best at what he does, but person who is better than the imitator. Eventually, according to Vives, one should be able to move up in rank and imitate the best. He says it is a wise pedagogy of M. Fabius Quintilian that boys should not at first attempt to rise to emulation of their master, lest their potence fail them. An easier and quicker method will be to let them imitate someone more learned than themselves among their fellows, and contending with him let them gradually rise to copying the ir master himself. (189) Alberti does not mention this method of imitation. Instead he says that when it comes to art, on must have the favors of nature. (Book I) In other words, Alberti strongly believes that one should have a natural talent for what he is doing, and that the gradual chain of profit is not necessarily an established method, as Vives indicates.Also, Alberti uses a style that is trivial and to the point. He says I beg that I may be pardoned if, where I above all wish to be understood, I have presumption more care to making my words clear than ornate. I believe that which follows will be less tedious to the reader. (Book I) This type of frankness is a distinguished style of writing.He uses simple rhetoric so that his interview can grasp the idea quickly. This kind of style corresponds to the type of art he is writing about. He says that he writing about a new type of art We are, however, building anew an art of painting about which nothing, as I see it, has been wr itten since this age.(Book II) His new style is imitating his concept of having a different type of manual towards art. Also, his main is to string away from the Ancients and more towards the Florentine. By changing his style of writing he is achieving this, not only through what he saying about graduating art from mechanical to liberal, but also through his style and techne.Both Alberti and Vives dribble time discussing conquer matter. Vives splits up who should be imitated based on the composition of the piece being writer. Similarly, Alberti pays attention to the subject matter of the painting. He says that an go for can only bring pleasure of the subject matter of the painting brings pleasure. Alberti believes that one must imitate the feeling he wants the viewer to have in the subject of his painting for the artwork to be successful. This is what Vives is saying when he illustrates that one must pick the best writer in the subject that he wants to write about and imitate t hat style to be successful.Both Petrarch and Alberti can be compared with Vives and his ideas on imitation. To all three writers imitation plays a huge role on how to present written and artistic works. All three of them believe that imitation of others will lead to success. Further, they believe that imitation is the only way to learn how to write properly. Alberti adds another assumption he says that to be the best, one must imitate, but before the imitation fulfill takes place, one must have a natural talent for art. Petrarch and Alberti both believe that one must mimic what they believe is the right tradition through their styles. Petrarch believes in the Ciceronian tradition and follows in Ciceros footsteps by imitating his style. Alberti is more concerned with understanding than the use of eloquent language. Overall, to all three writers imitation plays a huge role in their understanding of how written works influence their audiences.