Dramatic Literature : The Tragic Hero

Decision making plays an important role in human's lives. People can ruin their lives by making wrong decisions. In literature, these people are called tragic heroes. In detail, a tragic hero is a character who destroys his life by making a judgment error. Shakespeare's play, Hamlet, includes several tragic heroes. This play tells the story of a young, depressed prince named Hamlet, who wants to get revenge on his father's murderer, King Claudius. Unfortunately, he mistakes Polonius, King Claudius's advisor, for the King and kills him. This causes Laertes, Polonius's son, to kill Hamlet in retaliation for his father's death. Although Laertes is brave, he always acts quickly and without thinking. This behavior leads to his downfall and makes him a real, tragic hero.

In order to gain a proper perspective on the concept of what a tragic hero is, we must synthesize information from the following play’s, “The Death Of A Salesman”, and “Oedipus The King”. Both plays takes the stance on the idea that validates the ultimate notion,  “tragic hero. From Willy’s hubris personality to his questionable and mysterious death, to Oedipus dynamic and complex choices and kingly personality that determines his fate. A tragic hero is a literary character who makes a judgement that leads to his/her downfall. In other words, even though both characters made incredible contributions and left a very noble legacy, their choices and decisions determined their ultimate fate. In today’s world tragic heroes are commonly present,

The Tragic Hero and the Tragic Story in William Shakespeare's Writing Shakespeare's tragedies are, for the most part, stories of one person,

Literature utilizes the readers’ need to connect with a character. More often than not, with authors making their characters relatable in one sense or another that could be transferred into multiple stories. This idea of relatability is the core of the tragic hero, a trope used often in literature including in stories such as Sophocles’ Oedipus Rex, Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart, Shakespeare's Othello, and August Wilson’s Fences. Each from different years, authors, and genres, yet each utilizing the tragic hero to further their individual themes through depicting the greatness of a godlike man and his fall to lowest points within humanity.

Tragedy, like comedy, is in the eyes of the beholder and what makes a particular fictional character more tragic than another can be argued until the end of time. However, despite this, it seems that an undeniable part of what makes a character tragic is their ability to save themselves from their predicament but, for whatever reason, refuse to do so, thus damning themselves to their wretched fate. Likewise, the more obvious this ability, the more control that a character has over their fate, the more tragic their eventual downfall. Moreover, coupled with the preventable nature of the character’s tragic fate, is this fate’s unpredictability, which causes the audience to, even until the very end, have hope that the tragic character will triumph over their predicament. Furthermore, this is all merged with the ultimate insignificance of the tragic character’s demise and how, despite all their struggles, they are eventually rendered wholly irrelevant and forgotten. Hence, the most tragic of the three protagonists studied is Jay Gatsby because his final fate, compared to that of Willy Loman’s or Macbeth’s is the most unpredictable, had the least impact on society, and, ultimately, was the most avoidable.

As Aristotle once said, “A tragic hero is not an ordinary man, but a man with outstanding quality and greatness about him. His own destruction is for a greater cause or principle.” The character Ethan Frome in the novella, Ethan Frome by Edith Wharton can be classified as a tragic hero. After being physically and emotionally isolated in a loveless marriage for seven years, the protagonist, Ethan Frome, began his descent as a result of an error in judgement. As an effect of this isolation, Ethan follows his instincts instead of his intellect, leading to a punishment much more harsh than his initial crime. By making poor choices, Ethan poses a threat to society and causes suffering to family members, friends and associates. The common characteristics of a tragic hero include the character beginning with noble stature, enduring his “hamartia” (tragic flaw), and suffering a punishment that is worse than the crime. The character of Ethan Frome fits into the archetype of a tragic hero. Through using Ethan as a tragic hero, the author, Edith Wharton, is trying to convey the

The aristotelian tragic hero is thought to be of noble stature and to have a flaw that contributes to their own downfall. Though their misfortune may not be wholly deserved, awareness is gained along with an understanding of the situation rather than considering it a defeat. These characteristics coincide with Creon, Antigone, and Willy Loman. Their efforts for greatness were guided by flaws instead of strengths, which aided in their undoing.. Even if all three met with catastrophic endings, the series of events leading to that point differentiate for each person. Creon, Antigone, and Willy Loman all meet-and fail to meet- the definition of a tragic hero, yet face distinct situations that inevitably ended in misery.

The tragic hero of a story is not always the conflict resolver or the heroic lifesaver. In reality, protagonists such as the one in this play are flawed; their flaws can end up hurting others rather than helping them. In Shakespeare’s “Tragedy of Romeo and Juliet,” Romeo, who portrays the male protagonist, has a fatal flaw of impulsivity that influences him to make hasty decisions based on love. Romeo and Juliet, two lovers tied between a family feud, attempt to rewrite their fate as a couple. However, by doing so, characters such as Romeo end up setting themselves up for tragedy due to their impulsive actions. From marrying a blood feud enemy due to love at first sight to murdering cousin-in-laws, the tragic hero involved Shakespeare’s play

A tragic hero is a literacy character who makes a judgement error that leads them to their own destruction. A tragic flaw is the weakness of a character that brings about a tragic heroes downfall.in three different works we see tragic hero from 1984 Winston smith in 1984 written by George Orwell, Macbeth written by William Shakespeare and Saddam Hussein a dictator. The authors of the two character show that there is such thing as a tragic flaw and they believe fate doesn’t play a role in their downfall. This impacts oneself and the world because these character show their u can’t control your flaw it would lead you to your own devastation.

position in society. In addition, the downfall of a tragic hero is caused by fault of their own, often

A possible theme for Oedipus the King by Sophocles is that one’s blindness can hide the inevitability that is his destiny. Oedipus is in this situation. He struggles to escape his fate: killing his father and marrying his mother and believes he is successful. Sophocles believes that the gpds control one’s destiny and the inevitability that a person will do what is destined despite there hero’s intentions.Oedipus represent the standards of a true tragic hero: he is well known, basically good, his punishment is out of proportion compared to his crime, the audience at some point feels sorrow and pity for him, and Oedipus has a tragic flaw. During the whole story Oedipus thinks that he may be able to change his fate a live life how he wants but he falls to that which is his destiny.For these reason Oedipus is truly an example of a tragic hero and is unable to avoid his tragic fate.

Tragic heroes, according to Miller, actively and entirely commits themselves in a hopeless attempt to attain or regain their personal dignity. Miller states, “the tragic feeling is evoked in us when we are in the presence of a character who is ready to lay down his life, if need be, to secure one thing--his sense of personal dignity” (144). This statement emphasizes the absence of “personal dignity” that the character seeks to gain or regain, and it

Their fatal flaw or weakness in their character that brings about their downfall, is the main characterstic of these heroes. Many factors play major roles into these personas. Since these heroes experience a “downfall”, they must come from noble birth or some high ranking position, and the path to their downfall is often plagued by one or a series of poor choices. Towards the end of the work, the readers might feel sympathy or pity for these characters, which is an indication that the punishment for these heroes was too harsh for their shortcomings. The aim of the difficulty of the tragic heroes is to teach the readers valuable lesson.

A tragic hero is the main character in a tragedy story. He is the main theme.

The concept of tragic hero is very important in the construction of tragedy. It is the main cause of pity and fear. The tragic hero is a character between the two extremes; he is