Tragic
Drama
What is a tragedy? Discuss Greek Tragedy and
Shakespearean Tragedy.
Definition of a tragedy:
Tragedy is a common word in day-to-day life.
When a sad or unlucky event takes place, we say it is a tragedy. Newspapers
often write about road accidents and call it a tragedy. In dramas, too this
world is used carelessly. If a drama has a sad end or shows some deaths of
characters, it is a tragic drama. But in literature it is something more.
Serious action is very important. A great man should only do it. The action
should be described in a grand manner. Action or the incidents should be
capable of arousing the emotions of pity and fear. This would lead the reader
for the catharsis i.e. purgation.
Greek/Aristotelian Tragedy:-
The beginning of tragedy is to b found
in ancient Greece. Before the fifth century great Athenian dramatist like
Aeschylus, Sophocles and Euripides wrote tragedies. These are chief traits of
Greek tragedy.
1. Well- known stories of gods
and princes or king and heroes are described.
2. Strong religious elements
prevailed, and the belief that the god would punish those who broke the moral
law, which controls the world. divine to maintain divine justice.
3. Horrors and violence are
not shown on the stage. The chorus narrated them to the audience
4. There were only few actors
between two to five or six.
5. Characters were of high
class i.e. the figures like king queens, princes; princesses or heroes.
6. No mixing of tragic and
comic elements
Aristotle`s
questions:-
Aristotle (384-322 B.C) was living
at the same time when Greek tragedies were written and performed. Therefore, he
drew his ideas from them. He asked two question regarding this:-
1.
Why do we get pleasure and satisfaction seeing tragedy?
2.
What kind of person ought the chief character of a tragedy to be?
His answers were:
In real life, our certain emotions
especially of pity and fear do not get used. And tragedy stirs up and gets flow
away up like waste products. It is called purgation or catharses.
The hero of a tragedy should be neither good
nor bad. If he is too good, his fall will be shocking and if he were too bad,
we would not have pity on his face. For this, his own weakness (Hamartia) is
made responsible.
At last, he defined the tragedy in the
following term: Aristotle says, “Tragedy is an imitation of an action that is
serious and also, as having, magnitude, complete in itself, incidents arousing
pity and fear wherewith to accomplish the catharsis of such emotions”.
Catharsis/Purgation:
Aristotle was the first person
to use the word. When he was discussing the tragedy in general, he gave this
word. In his “Poetics”, he defined the tragedy where we have seen the word
“Catharsis”. It is a Greek word. This means Purgation. It is related to human
psychology. Aristotle’s father was related to medicines. Naturally, he would
have some effect of this occupation.
Before we go to explain the
word, we have to remember that there are many critics who have disputes over
this word. Some discussions are going on. But we shall see tragedy in general
manner. To answer and explain the tragedy he has asked a question that why we
are taking interest and get pleasure in seeing their things, which we are not
enjoying in reality. He says that,
“Certain
emotions especially the emotion of pity and fear, do not get used enough in
civilized life.”
Tragedy has many effects.
Among them one is to stir up (move up) these emotions so they flow away from us
like the waste products of the body after purgation. Actually Purgation is related with physical
nature. It brings out waste products of the body while Catharsis brings out
waste products of the mind. This is difference between these words but as we
have seen that,
“The
Greek word for Catharsis is Purgation”
Hamartia:
In his ‘Poetics’ Aristotle has
defines “What is Tragedy?” He studied his contemporary plays and found two
questions regarding the psychology of theatre going. From those answers, we
have answer of the above questions. He went on the idea of Catharsis and purgation.
Hamartia is related with
Aristotle’s other question: What kind of person ought the chief character (or
hero or protagonist) of a tragedy be?
1. The hero of tragedy should
not completely bad. He does not suit tragedy. If he is bad, he will not get
sympathy of the reader or spectator, because we do not have pity to bad
characters. When he suffers or dies, we shall not feel pity or sympathy. We
think it was fit to him. Our desire satisfied actually such bad character is
given punishment and our joy increases.
2. In the other hand, he
should not be completely good. If he is a completely good man we shall feel
shacked and depressed when he suffers. Our sense of justice will have no faith
in good. Good man will never have sympathy if it is so. We shall think that God
has no control over the world.
“Hamartia” is a Latin word
meaning “a weakness of the hero” or “a fatal flow”. So Aristotle thought the
hero ought to be “Good but not good”. It means that he should be a person like
ourselves and we can admire him. He should be such a person that we can have
sympathy. For this his suffering or death should be caused by his own fault, by
some weakness in his character, or by some mistake which he himself has made.
We have beautiful examples of
this trait. Shakespeare's ‘Hamlet’ is such character. He is good, kind,
thoughtful, gentle, and cultivated, all the characteristics that a hero should
have. but he has his own Hamartia, a fault, which is his ‘indecisive’ power. He
always is in a state of ‘To be or not to be’. In addition, this is his
weakness, which in the end cause his death and that of several others.
So regarding the Aristotelian
hero it is necessary of ‘Hamartia’. Aristotle when he was thinking of Hamartia,
Catharsis, or Purgation, now his all ideas are relevant for all kinds of
Tragedies and also in novels. This is the unequal contribution in this field.
Giving this word to English
Literature, we owe much to Aristotle. Without Aristotle’s definitions and
explanation of tragedy, we would have missed many things but we are fortunate
that even today we have to remember Aristotle first.
Moral
Conflict:
Conflict is necessary in any
tragedy play. Many plots deal with a conflict. Conflict can be individual as
well as collective or it can be inward or outward. Hero makes conflict against
fate or circumstances which stand between him and a goal he has sett for
himself and in some work, the conflict is between opposing, dislikes or values
in a character’s own mind.
G. H. Hegel (1770-1831)
brought the idea of moral conflict when he studied Sophocles’ play “Antigone”.
We don’t discuss the subject and story of the play but to Hegel it seemed that
the ‘Antigone’ was the perfect example of tragedy. We know that the substance
of all drama is conflict.
The conflict generally appears
as a simple one between good and evil, right and wrong. In tragedy however,
things are less simple, the conflicts are between two rights. Antigone makes
burial of her brother. It is proper according to religious point. But burial
was prohibited. So it is conflict. Creon suffers lots of between his duty as a
ruler and protector of the city and his duty as the uncle and protector of
Antigone. Such moral conflicts are necessary part of life.
The conflict between love and
duty is favourite subject of a thousands films and novels as well as of great
tragedies like “Romeo and Juliet”. Simple conflict can be between right and
wrong. But conflict between two opposite rights is more suitable to the
tragedies. Before Hegel no one had shown this kind of moral conflict. We are
thankful to him for his aesthetic in which he mentioned this idea.
