TRAGEDY
TERM
BASIC DEFINITIONS
TRAGEDY
In drama, it is the representation of serious actions which turn out
disastrously for the main character. It is a form of drama in which the
protagonist, having some quality of greatness, comes to disaster through
some flaw in his/her nature.
CATHARSIS
This means the purgation of the emotions of pity and fear which are
aroused by the actions of the tragic hero. These emotions leave the viewers
both relieved and elated.
TRAGIC HERO
This is the protagonist who suffers a change in fortune from happiness to
misery because of a mistaken act due to his tragic flaw or tragic error in
judgment. The tragic hero moves the audience to pity because the
misfortune is greater that he deserves and to fear because we recognize
similar possibilities and consequences in our own selves. The character,
usually of high birth, neither totally good nor totally evil, whose downfall
is brought about by some weakness or error in judgment.
TRAGIC FLAW
The tragic flaw or tragic error in judgment happens through ignorance or
because of a moral flaw. Aristotle states that the tragic hero moves the
audience to pity because the misfortune is greater than s/he has deserved,
and to fear because s/he recognizes similar possibilities and consequences
in his/her own fallible self. Aristotle also states that the tragic hero will
most effectively arouse pity and fear if s/he is neither thoroughly good nor
thoroughly evil, but a man like any of us; however, through the tragic
effect s/he will be stronger if he is rather better than most of us. For
instance, Oedipus’ error is twofold: the slaying of his father is the result of
impetuousness; the marrying of his mother, the result of ignorance.
HUBRIS
The arrogance or overweening pride which causes the hero’s transgression
against the gods. This is also the tragic flaw.
FATE
This is a word meaning destiny, fortune, or lot. Although often used
lightly fate emphasizes the irrationality and the impersonal (cold)
character of events. Approximate synonyms for fate occasionally
appearing in literature include karma, kismet, chance, and luck.
The three Fates and the cruel Fates are phrases also appearing in literary
works. Ancient Greeks and Romans believed that the Fates controlled the
birth, life, and death of everyone.
Clotho: She held the staff and started the thread of life.
Lachesis: She spun the thread of life.
Atropos: She cut the thread when life was ended.
TRAGEDY
From: http://academic, Brooklyn.cuny/English/melani/cs6/tragedy.html
ELIZABETHAN
AND
A distinctly English form of tragedy begins with the Elizabethans.
SHAKESPEAREAN The translation of Seneca and the reading of Aristotle’s Poetics were major
TRAGEDY
influences. Many critics and playwrights, such as Ben Jonson, insisted on
observing the classical unities of action, time and place (the action should
be one whole and take place in one day and in one place). However, it was
romantic tragedy, which Shakespeare wrote in Richard II, Macbeth,
Hamlet, and King Lear, which prevailed. Romantic tragedy disregarded the
unities (as in the used of subplots), mixed tragedy and comedy, and
emphasized action, spectacle, and –increasingly—sensation. Shakespeare
violated the unities in these ways and also in mixing poetry and prose and
using the device of a play-within-a-play, as in Hamlet.