The Effectiveness Of A Connection

In both essays, two common themes revealed are the dominance of man and to find the perfect female spouse to satisfy their male spouses need. Ideas that are being presented are girls need to stay girly and attractive and males cannot sustain friendship with females. Each author elaborates on what the ideal male or female is. The author Paul Theroux talks more about how society sees as a man in his essay “Being a Man” and uses metaphors and hyperboles to get through readers. While the author Judy Brady explains what the ideal female is viewed as in her essay “I Want a Wife” and uses satire and domestic ideology.

Ajax is a Greek tragedy, written by Sophocles, that follows a greek hero named Ajax, and its follows his fate until his suicide. Ajax has a different take on warfare, because it talked about the madness that took over Ajax and the following breakdown after that which is reminiscent to PTSD. The passage 311-330 in Ajax is an example of Ajax’s PTSD, in summary the passage is after Ajax’s slaughter of the cattle, Ajax has a breakdown after Tecmessa told him what he has done. Tecmessa is worried about Ajax and is pleading to the chorus to go talk to them.

            To identify the tragic hero in Sophocles’ renowned play “Antigone”, we should first consider both the elements present in Greek tragedies and what characteristics define a tragic hero. Aristotle’s definition of tragedy is: “Tragedy is a story taking the hero from happiness to misery because of a fatal flaw or mistake on his part. To be a true tragic hero he must also elicit a strong emotional response of pity and fear from the audience. This is known as catharsis or purging of emotion.” In most cases the tragic hero begins

For a play titled Ajax, the exposition serves as a curious contrast to the rest of the story. By introducing the tragedy in media res with Athena and Odysseus, Sophocles skips past the fuss of the armor debacle and instead delves straight into the aftermath of the event. Athena, who knows of Ajax’s deadly intentions, chooses to redirect his violence towards the innocent livestock. Seeing that this act was Ajax’s definitive moment, not including it in the play raises the question, what role does Athena play in setting the course of the story? It is generally thought Athena is callous and cruel and that she is punishing Ajax for his attempt upon the chieftains, but there is hardly anything in the play to justify such assumptions. I will argue Athena’s spell over Ajax is an act of salvation rather than an act of punishment and through this intervention Ajax attains honor after death with his proper burial. This not only provides insight into Athena’s behavior but also brings the play to a full circle with the reintegration of Odysseus as an instrument of Athena’s intentions.

In the Poetics, Aristotle provides an outline of how the artist is to portray or represent the perfect Tragedy. A Tragedy, of course, was nothing more than a drama, in which the characters appeared "better" than in real life (in a comedy, they appeared "worse," according to Aristotle). Aristotle's Poetics makes several references to other dramatic works to illustrate his points, but he most commonly calls upon The Odyssey to support his argument for how a dramatic structure should be designed. However, along with the Odyssey, Aristotle extensively references Sophocles' Oedipus Rex. Both poetic works were enormously popular in their time (the former had been passed down orally for generations, and the latter won the top prizes at the dramatic festivals). Therefore, Aristotle is comfortable using both to support his viewpoint concerning Tragedy and the Tragic Hero. This paper will analyze the standards that Aristotle sets out concerning the definition of the Tragic Hero and show how Sophocles' Oedipus exemplifies Aristotle's definition of a Tragic Hero.

In his Poetics, which serves until today as a guide to evaluate drama, Aristotle argued that a dramatic piece of literature must appeal to ethos, logos and pathos. They should use the literary devices of emotion, logic and a sense of ethics/morality in their appeal to readers. Both Sophocles’ Oedipus The King and Shakespeare’s Macbeth, employ these literary strategies, as shall be explored below but, it is safe to say that comparisons end there. Both Macbeth and Oedipus have earned their reputations for bravery, both act rashly and commit the ultimate crime of regicide, which comes back to haunt them however, Oedipus’ course of action was fated by the gods whereas Macbeth acted freely and upon his own ambitions, which were awakened by Lady Macbeth.

During ancient Greek times, the audience plays a crucial role in a tragedy´s success. Without them, tragedies would´ve faded away. However, it is critical to remember how an audience feels during a performance, like in Oedipus. In Oedipus, the audience feels pity and fear towards Oedipus because of his flaws and misgivings. For instance the audience pities Oedipus in Oedipus Rex because the audience have watched the tragedy before and knew what was going to happen beforehand.

Aristotle, the great fourth-century Greek philosopher labeled this tragedy as “an imitation of an action of high importance, complete and of some amplitude: in language enhanced by distinct and varying beauties…by means of pity and fear effecting its purgation of these emotions” (qtd. in Kennedy & Gioia 885). Aristotle was portraying the epic Shakespearean drama, Othello. Aristotle prescribed three main elements for a disastrous theater recipe: First is a hamartia, or a tragic flaw in the main character that leads to the demise; second, catharsis or an emotional release of the audience’s sensations derived from the actors, so they seem to have felt they have learnt something about the play; and lastly, anagnorisis or the character’s astonishment of something that may have not before realized (Kennedy & Gioia 856-857). The protagonist in Shakespeare’s Othello satisfies all of Aristotle’s necessities for a tragic hero, as Othello is the character of magnificent status, which falls from that status of power to one of shame because of his hamartia. Furthermore the plot of Othello contains an influential katharsis through its peak and deduction, and an anagnorisis when Othello comprehends that Desdemona and Iago are not who they appear to

Picture yourself going from being the King of Thebes to a widowed, motherless man who is forced to exile and fend for himself without sight. This is what occurred in Sophocles’ play, Oedipus Rex. A tragedy is composed of six elements that determine the quality of each part. It starts off with a flaw that leads to a hero’s passing, the acknowledgement of these flaws, and lethal punishment of the tragic hero. The play, Oedipus Rex, is about a king who finds out that he killed his own father and married his mother. Throughout the discovery, he doubted the citizens and a new side of Oedipus arose. Aristotle, the creator of the tragic hero cycle, thought Oedipus was the ideal example of a tragic hero. The six elements are present within Sophocles’ play beginning with the hamartia, leading to the anagnorisis, and concluding with the nemesis.

Hundreds of years ago Greek plays were very popular. People would plan to go to these plays for entertainment and to have fun with their friends. These plays would also help to teach the audience all about Greek mythology. The main character in these plays often had something tragic occur at the end, such as death. This character was the referred to as the “tragic hero.” A couple hundred years later a Greek philosopher named Aristotle described tragedy with 4 simple elements, nobility of the character, the flaws of the tragic hero, the start of the tragic hero’s downfall, and his/her punishment. In Things Fall Apart, Oedipus, and Antigone there is a character that shows this definition of tragedy by the end of the book and or play. This is usually caused by something called hubris, excessive pride. Things Fall Apart, Oedipus, and Antigone all fulfill Aristotle 's definition of tragedy.

Tragedy as an element of the human experience has been the subject of many of the great works of literature written in the Western tradition. For some, tragedy embodies the highest form of humanity. It is through suffering that we are able to reveal ourselves most completely. Others see tragedy as an element of morality where we are to learn well the lessons of those who tempt the gods. The Ancient Greek philosopher, Aristotle, outlined a theory of tragedy as archetypal drama in his classic work, the Poetics. He uses the play by Sophocles, Oedipus the King (hereafter "Oedipus"), as the standard model by which all other tragedies are measured. In Aristotle's view, a perfect

Throughout time, the tragedy has been seen as the most emotionally pleasing form of drama, because of its ability to bring the viewer into the drama and feel for the characters, especially the tragic hero. This analysis of tragedy was formed by the Greek philosopher Aristotle, and also noted in his Poetics (guidelines to drama). As a playwright, Shakespeare used Aristotle’s guidelines to tragedy when writing Othello. The play that was created revolved around the tragic hero, Othello, whose tragic flaw transformed him from a nobleman, into a destructive creature, which would inevitably bring him to his downfall. This transformation follows an organic movement of the complex plot from the beginning, middle, to the end of the drama while

Aristotle’s poetics goes into vast detail regarding what characteristics are necessary for a top-notch tragedy. While these norms ' may seem to be easily understood through the reading of Aristotle’s fine-tuned poetics, there is a different understanding that needs to be interpreted to truly grasp the significance and qualifications that makeup a good tragedy. Of the many tragedies that Euripides provides us with, I chose the tragedy of Medea to further analyze, and present a strong argument for why I think Aristotle would find Medea a top-notch tragedy. According to Aristotle, a top-notch tragedy consists of six main elements, a strong plot, storyline, style, morals, ideas, staging and music, with the most important of these six being that of the plot. I strongly feel that in terms of what entails a quality tragedy, Euripides Medea meets a large majority of these things. Medea offers us a tragedy that is filled with a concrete plot, a strong source of tragic effect as well as a well-put together sequence of events to which lead up to the unfolding of such events.

After reading this type of tragic play “Oedipus the King” written by Sophocles you can see that the author did a very outstanding form of presenting a tragedy that has the characteristics of mimesis and a tragic hero. Specifically, the writer written the play that would leave many readers to be able to relate to and have a character whom characteristics are noble and basically good. A purpose of tragedy is “catharsis”. In other words, the main reason for a tragedy in a play is to purge an individual of

Throughout Poetics, Aristotle describes what traits a tragedy must have to be successful. To support these choices, he makes use of a small analysis of many tragedies, including many of Sophocles’ plays; Oedipus Rex is one of the plays mentioned in Aristotle’s Poetics. Some of these traits include a successful plot structure, recognition scenes, and a correct choice for its hero. In Oedipus Rex, Sophocles fulfills all of these requirements.