This section substantiates the claim that Xenophanes, Parmenides and Empedocles played an instrumental role in the emergence of what may be termed the Classical conception of literature – that is, the view that a work of literature is a mortally crafted artefact that reflects a true state of affairs only symbolically or mimetically – by drawing attention to evidence for their influence on certain important developments in fifth- and fourth-century BCE poetics. These include (a) fifth-century practices of allegorical interpretation; (b) Gorgias’ statements that poetry is deceptive and is a kind of charm or drug; (c) Democritus’ physical explanations for poetic inspiration and composition; (d) Democritus and the sophists’ analytical approaches to language; and (e) the conceptions of mimesis presented by Plato.