Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun Literary criticism that deals with the nature, forms, and laws of poetry.
  • noun A treatise on or study of poetry or aesthetics.
  • noun The practice of writing poetry; poetic composition.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun That branch of criticism which treats of the nature and laws of poetry.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun The principles and rules of the art of poetry.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun philosophy, literature The theory of poetry, or of literature in general

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun study of poetic works

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From the Poetics of Aristotle

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