Recommended Reading
Tragedy
originated in religious rites of Ancient Greece, that may originally have been concerned with burial or fertility rites or Dionysus, developing into three annual Athenian festivals, by the 5th century BC, in honour of Dionysus, god of wine and song; the most important of which was the great three day competition of plays, in late March. The word comes from goat song. There are several theories as to why but no one really knows for sure. It could be:
- The sacrifice of a goat at the ceremony. An altar stands on the stage.
- Actors in the early, rural ceremonies were dressed as satyrs (goat men).
Aristotle’s Poetics
Aristotle, living a hundred years later, analysed the tragedies of the 5th C BC religious festivals in his Poetics and arrived at a list of rules for the best tragedy.
Definition: Tragedy is a representation in dignified poetry of serious action, complete in itself and of some length and scope.
Purpose: to arouse pity and fear in the audience, in order to sweep away repressed pity and fear that build up in normal life, so you come away wiser and calmer.
Essential Components of Tragedy in the order of their importance
- Plot: the ordering of the incidents is the most important component.
- Character
- Diction (speech, the expressive use of words, poetic style)
- Thought (ideas, themes)
- Song, music and dance
- Spectacle (stagecraft, movement, props, costumes, cranes for flying)
Structure and Form of Tragedy and the Unities of Time and Place
- The action on stage happens within one day.
- The action on stage happens in one place.
- The plot should be about one thing. Nothing could be added or taken away and achieve the same effect.
- The action has a clear beginning, middle and end.
- The story is presented through speeches and action, not a narration.
- Plots must be easy to remember.
- Long enough to allow for a credible downfall from happiness to misery
- Should move inexorably from prosperity through complications to a shock reversal then the denouement or unravelling
Plot is the most important because even reading a tragedy has impact. The best plots are complex, with:
- reversals – unexpected changes of fortune, often coupled with discoveries
- recognition – sudden realisation of things previously unknown, discoveries.
- calamities – great and undeserved suffering
- chance occurrences, significant coincidences that seem fated to happen.
Character and thought are the means for presenting action. The hero’s choices lead to happiness or unhappiness that arises out of the action, not out of his character.
Thought: facts, refutations, general opinions and emotions. Universal Truths are presented, not historical facts. Tragedy is more philosophical than history.
Diction: expressive speech - not so brilliant as to distract from plot & character
The Tragic Hero
Characteristics of a tragic hero according to Aristotle (4th Century BC)
- As morally good as, or slightly better than average
- Male (A woman is an inferior being and a slave is insignificant.)
- Have a character flaw or make a bad choice that causes his downfall through the action which unfolds as a consequence. Vice does not cause his fall.
- He must suffer far beyond what he deserves. The cosmic moral order, the gods or fate cause his fall, not his character. It is beyond his full control.
- Noble or influential so that his downfall will destroy a nation or household
- Life-like
- Consistent (or consistently inconsistent – They can’t act out of character.)
- Characters should be appropriate: a female character should not be given manliness or cleverness.
- He enjoys prosperity and / or a high reputation at the start.
- His actions and sufferings must arouse pity and fear in the audience so there is only one main character (the protagonist), providing a focus of empathy.
Characters speak and unfold action without external explanation. The poet should speak as little as possible in his own voice. The chorus should be a character not a commentator on events.
Violence should not be shown on stage. It should be reported by a messenger.
Anything irrational has to be kept in the background before the story starts. The whole situation is often bizarre but once in it and the play starts, everything that happens is a natural, credible, even inevitable consequence. The action of the play tends to encourage us to believe in the unlikely starting position.
Medieval Tragedy
- prose or poetic narrative, not a drama
- a reversal of fortune, a fall from a high position
- Dame Fortune, a blindfolded woman turns a wheel suddenly and the man on top is suddenly destroyed under the wheel while a poor man is raised high.
Elizabethan, Shakespearian and Jacobean Tragedy
- Influenced by a reading of Aristotle’s Poetics and the Roman, Seneca.
- Some playwrights, like Ben Jonson, followed Aristotle strictly.
- Shakespeare violated "rules": mixed prose and poetry, ignored the unities of one thing, time and place, introduced a play within a play, violence shown on stage, romantic heroes, subplots, tragicomedy and conflicts between the hero and the law or conventional thinking, leading to modern Drama of Ideas.
Questions
What are your first thoughts about the meaning of the word TRAGEDY?
Can you name any literary tragedies or tragic figures?
How is tragedy different from history or journalism or life?
Might Aristotle consider any of the following tragic stories or tragic figures? Give reasons why he might not allow tragic status.
Oedipus
Antonio, the Merchant of Venice
Shylock
Hamlet
Romeo and Juliet
Of Mice and Men
Princess Diana
Michael Jackson
Hitler
The McCanns
A soldier who died in Afghanistan
