Aristotle is one of the most important western philosophers in history that has influenced our society in many aspects. Many of Aristotle’s teachings have affected our world for many years and still continue to have such a big impact. Some of the subjects Aristotle has influenced include: logic, physics, government and poetry. Aristotle’s study of poetry mainly focused on the elements to a good tragedy. Some of his elements have been used in Greek tragedies and modern movies. The Greek play, Medea, and the modern movie, No Country for Old Men, use elements from Aristotle philosophy, while using similar and different techniques but both achieving an effective tragedy.
In Aristotle’s book, Poetics, he defines tragedy as, “an imitation of an action that is serious, complete, and possessing magnitude; in embellished language, each kind of which is used separately in the different parts; in the mode of action and not narrated; and effecting through pity and fear” (Aristotle 1149). Tragedy creates a cause and effect chain of actions that clearly gives the audience ideas of possible events. The six parts to Aristotle’s elements of tragedy are: Plot, character, language, thought, spectacle, and melody. According to Aristotle, the most important element is the plot. Aristotle writes in Poetics that, “It is not for the purpose of presenting their characters that the agents engage in action, but rather it is for the sake of their actions that they take on the characters they have” (Aristotle 1150). Plots should have a beginning, middle, and end that have a unity of actions throughout the play making it complete. In addition, the plot should be complex making it an effective tragedy. The second most important element is character. Characters...
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...hough the two demonstrate the elements in different ways, they both achieve an effective tragedy. Now after learning about Aristotle’s philosophy on tragedy, one can examine any type of tragic poetry, play, movie and analysis if the elements are portrayed. Its interesting to see how much of Aristotle’s philosophy has effected poetry in the art of the Greek tragedy, Medea, and the modern movie, No Country for Old Men.
Works Cited
Aristotle. Poetics. Trans. Gerald F. Else. Ann Arbor: U of Michigan P, 1967. Dorsch, T. R., trans. and ed. Aristotle Horace Longinus: Classical Literary Criticism. New York: Penguin, 1965. Ley, Graham. The Ancient Greek Theater. Chicago: U of Chicago P, 1991. Reinhold, Meyer. Classical Drama, Greek and Roman. New York: Barrons, 1959.
Puchner, Martin. The Norton Anthology of World Literature. Vol. A. New York: W.W. Norton &, 2012. Print.
Puchner, Martin, , et al. The Norton Anthology of World Literature . Third. a. New York: W.W, Norton & Company, Inc., 2012. 230-331. Print.
Neoclassical writers emphasized the importance of the Poetics of Aristotle, as well as the unities of place, time, and action that they extracted from his works. In Poetics, Aristotle laid out the six essential elements of tragedy: plot, character, diction, thought, spectacle, and song (McManus). Each of these components held certain value to what Aristotle believed to be a successful play, however, plot and character held to be the most important.
Aristotle defines tragedy in his respected piece Poetics and many other forms of literature. Many tragic heroes such as Oedipus Rex and Romeo and Juliet fit well into this mold of a tragic hero as defined by Aristotle. For example, they were flawed but well intentioned and their lives ended in a catastrophic death. Those plays, and many others in the genre, had all the elements of a tragedy: plot, character, thought, diction, melody, and spectacle. They were fantastic displays of misery that aroused pity and fear in the audience.
McManus, Barbera F. “Outline of Aristotle's Theory of Tragedy in the Poetics.” Nov. 1999. Web. 4 Nov. 2011. .
Aristotle believes that the most important part of the definition of tragedy is the plot or action,
Aristotle, a philosopher, scientist, spiritualist and passionate critic of the arts, spent many years studying human nature and its relevance to the stage. His rules of tragedy in fact made a deep imprint on the writing of tragic works, while he influenced the structure of theatre, with his analysis of human nature. Euripides 'Medea', a Greek tragedy written with partial adherence to the Aristotelian rules, explores the continuation of the ancient Greek tales surrounding the mythology of Medea, Princess of Colchis, and granddaughter of Helios, the sun god, with heartlessness to rival the infamous Circe. While the structure of this play undoubtedly perpetuates many of the Aristotelian rules, there are some dramatic structures which challenge its standing with relevance to Aristotle's guidelines, and the judgment of Medea as a dramatic success within the tragic genre.
...n Aristotle’s view of characters. Aristotle also suggests that a tragedy should have the power to provoke audience’s emotion of pity and fear. The suffering and behavior of each character in Hamlet possess that power. The author agrees with the Aristotelian analysis of Hamlet, the story of Hamlet was perfectly based on Aristotle’s tragedy theory. However, the author thinks that the tragedy doesn’t always have to end up in misery. A tragic story can also have some hidden happiness in the suffering, misery of tragic hero(s), in which way can audience realize that there is still hopeful when your life is tragic and encourage people to strive hard to create a better life.
Domrosch, David. Longman Anthology of World Literature, The, Compact Edition. 1st Edition. Pearson College Div: Longman, 2007. Print.
According to Aristotle, a tragedy must be an imitation of life in the form of a serious story that is complete in itself among many other things. Oedipus is often portrayed as the perfect example of what a tragedy should be in terms of Aristotle’s Poetics. Reason being that Oedipus seems to include correctly all of the concepts that Aristotle describes as inherent to dramatic tragedy. These elements include: the importance of plot, reversal and recognition, unity of time, the cathartic purging and evocation of pity and fear, the presence of a fatal flaw in the “hero”, and the use of law of probability.
For several thousands of years, drama has existed among mankind. The ancient Greeks are accredited with the creation of drama, which began as simple religious rituals and eventually evolved into the more complex forms of tragedies and comedies. The first rules of drama, not surprisingly, were also written by a Greek--the famous philosopher and intellectual, Aristotle. Aristotle took note of the what qualities created a successful dramatic piece by observing a plethora of plays written by different Greek dramatists. As a result of what he observed, Aristotle compiled a set of guidelines to define the perfect tragedy. So influential, thorough, and well crafted were his writings that many poets and playwrights since have patterned their own works after them.
According to Aristotle, the importance of tragedy as a genre is to represent action. Thus unity of action purportedly has the strongest implications for the effectiveness of the work itself. Aristotle posits “a story, since it is the representation of action, should concern an action that is single and entire, with its several incidents so structured that the displacement or removal of any one of them would disturb and dislocate the whole.” (Aristotle 27) and deems this claim imperative. A good plot, and thereby an effective tragedy, does not include events, which are not connected to each other or specifically the main plot. In theory, these unconnected events are distracting from the main action and dissipate the tragic effect. With Aristotle’s definition, no sub-plot should exist in tragedy. For all events to be “necessary or [have] probable connection with each other.” (Aristotle 27) none should exist not directly related to the main action. Again, unity allows for the tragic effect to be concentrated, intending to allow for increased feelings of pity and
One may argue that the Greek playwright, Sophocles modeled his play Oedipus Rex on Aristotle's definition and analysis of tragedy. Since according to Aristotle's definition, a tragedy is an imitation of action that is serious, complete and of a certain magnitude; in language embellished artistic ornaments, the several kinds being found in separate parts of the play; in the form of action, not narrative with incidents that evokes pity and fear of a persons emotions. Also Aristotle identified the basic six parts a tragedy as being plot, character, thought, melody, diction and spectacle which he considered the least important. Therefore the controversy of Sophocles modeling his play Oedipus Rex on Aritotle's analysis of tragedy can be argued out since the play Oedipus Rex is a classic Aristotelian tragedy. However this conception is totally fallacious since it is a well known fact that Aristotle lived a century after Sophocles.
Greek Drama had three main categories The Comedy, Satyr Plays, and The Tragedy. The most popular of the three is The Tragedy, its themes are often such as loss of love, complex relationships between men and the gods, and corruption of power. These dramas taught the people of the city the difference between good and bad behavior and the ramifications of going against the gods. According to Aristotle, the perfect tragedy consisted of the downfall of the hero through a great misunderstanding, causing suffering and awareness for the protagonist meanwhile making the audience feel pity and fear. The prominent writer who Aristotle based his perfect tragedy theory was Sophocles, his drama Oedipus the King had all the elements of a perfect tragedy.
Oedipus the King is an excellent example of Aristotle's theory of tragedy. The play has the perfect Aristotelian tragic plot consisting of paripeteia, anagnorisis and catastrophe; it has the perfect tragic character that suffers from happiness to misery due to hamartia (tragic flaw) and the play evokes pity and fear that produces the tragic effect, catharsis (a purging of emotion).
Shakespeare followed Aristotle’s guidelines to a perfect tragedy to the letter. Each and every one of the points is represented in Hamlet as well as his other tragedies. Through his rich use of language and plot, Aristotle’s guidelines were revived and will live immortally through Shakepeare’s works.