The word mimesis means imitation and comes from the Greek words mimeisthat for copy and mimos for imitator. There are a number of other words related to mimesis that are similar, such as mime and mimic. Plato dealt with mimesis and the notion that art is a representation of something else in his book The Republic, but it was Aristotle whose writings in Poetics had the most influence. Aristotle (around 330 BC) made mimesis the basis of his theory of art. He wrote in Poetics that literary works, such as dramas, are imitations of reality and suggests that there are three kinds of imitation: the medium of imitation, the objects that are imitated, and the mode of imitation.

For the medium of imitation, he discusses various ...