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Aristotle & Greek Tragedy

Aristotle & Greek Tragedy. Aristotle (384-322 BCE). Great thinker, teacher, and writer of the ancient world Studied at Plato’s Academy for about 20 years Wrote/lectured on logic, science, metaphysics, ethics, politics, literature

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Aristotle & Greek Tragedy

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  1. Aristotle&Greek Tragedy

  2. Aristotle (384-322 BCE) • Great thinker, teacher, and writer of the ancient world • Studied at Plato’s Academy for about 20 years • Wrote/lectured on logic, science, metaphysics, ethics, politics, literature • 350 BCE wrote Poetics, in part as an answer to Plato’s Republic(Plato believed drama encouraged people to wallow in emotion and endangered rationality and intellect; Aristotle strongly disagreed!)

  3. What is drama? • From the Greek word “dran” (to do)drama is an imitation of action • “First, the instinct of imitation is implanted in man from childhood, one difference between him and other animals being that he is the most imitative of living creatures, and through imitation learns his earliest lessons; and no less universal is the pleasure felt in things imitated. We have evidence of this in the facts of experience. Objects which in themselves we view with pain, we delight to contemplate when reproduced with minute fidelity.” [Poetics, Chapter lV]

  4. What is tragedy? • From the Greek word “tragoidia” (song of goats)originally referring to ritual sacrifice, as to Dionysus, god of fertility when things went wrong, there was a pharmakos, or “scapegoat” tragic plays replicated the idea of sacrifice for the good of a community • According to Aristotle, a tragedy was a poetic form in which an imitation of action evoked pity and fear in the audience, leading to an emotional catharsis (purification, cleansing). (The audience shared in the hero’s suffering, or pathos.)

  5. Tragic elements • According to Aristotle, a tragedy consisted of six elements: • Plot • Character • Thought (the idea or theme) • Diction (the language) • Music (rhythm and sound of the play) • Spectacle (costume, scenery, gestures, voice)

  6. The tragic hero • According to Aristotle, a tragic hero demonstrates: • Nobleness or wisdom by virtue of birth • Hamartia, anagnorisis, and peripeteia • Other common qualities: • High social status (a king or leader, whose people suffer with him) • Subject to fate, but experiences that fate through his own actions • Emotional wound often paralleled by a physical wound or death

  7. The tragic form • hamartia: an error on the part of the hero • can translate to “missing the mark” • can be regarded as a mistake, a sin, a trespass • often described as the result of an excess in behavior (i.e. hubris) or, in other words, a “tragic flaw” in character • peripeteia: reversal of fortune • Aristotle explained that the reversal could be from bad to good fortune, or good to bad fortune, but he said the latter form was superior. • Leads to a complication of events that must later be resolved

  8. The tragic form, cont. • anagnorisis: recognition of truth on the part of the hero • often a truth about identity • the hero can no longer ignore this truth, and he or she may feel incapable of living with it • May produce love or hate between key characters • catharsis: purging of pity and fear • the positive social function of tragedy, according to Aristotle • an emotional lesson: perhaps the audience can avoid the tragic error, and help others to avoid it

  9. The Greek Theatre theatron:“seeingplace” orchestra: circulardancing placefor chorus parodos: aisle for chorus access skene: buildingproviding backdrop andbackstage proskenion: small platform for elevation of actors

  10. The mask served both as a megaphone and as a symbol to distinguish the role. Greek Masks A mask was called a persona.

  11. Dramatic Structure • Prologue (plural: prologos) • Opening portion of the play • Sets the scene and contains the exposition • Parode (plural: parodos) • Entrance song of the chorus

  12. Dramatic Structure • Episode • Scene in the action of the drama • Performed by the actors, not the chorus • Alternate with the stasima • Within a scene, there may be a kommos,a lamentation between actor and chorus • Stasimon (plural: stasima) • Choral passage, sometimes referred to as odes • Type of lyric poem, using dignified diction • May consist of strophes (as the chorus chanted and danced in one direction) and antistrophes (dancing in the opposite direction) • May have been accompanied by flute and/or percussion

  13. Dramatic Structure • Exode (plural: exodos) • Concluding section of the tragedy • Ends with the chorus singing their final lines as they exit.

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