Six parts of Tragedy

Name: Joshi Toral B.

Paper: 3

 Literary Criticism & Theory

Topic: - Six parts of Tragedy

SEM: 3,

M.A. II

Year: 2012

Submitted to,

Dr. Dilip Barad,

M.K. Bhavnagar University,

Bhavnagar

Definition of Tragedy:-

“Tragedy that is an imitation of an action that is serious, complete and of a certain magnitude; in the language embellished with each kind of artistic ornaments , the several kinds being found in separate parts of play, in the form of action, not of narrative, through pity and fear effecting the proper purgation, catharsis of  these and similar emotions.”

We can break up it into seven parts.

1.     Tragedy involves mimesis.

2.     Tragedy is serious

3.     The action is complete and with certain magnitude

4.     Tragedy is made up of language with the “aesthetic ornaments” of rhythm and harmony.

5.     These “aesthetic ornaments” are not used throughout, but are introduced in separate parts of the work so that for instance some bits are spoken in verse and other bits are sung.

6.     Tragedy is performed rather than narrated.

7.     Tragedy arouses the emotion of pity and fear and accomplishes a catharsis of these emotions.

                    Aristotle asserts that any tragedy can be divided into six parts. Every tragedy is made up of these six parts with nothing else besides.

 1. Plot

 2. Character

 3. Thought

4 .Diction

5. Melody

6. Spectacle

                    So let us discuss about “Hamlet” as a tragic drama.

                    A Shakespearean tragedy has been defined as a story of exceptional calamity leading to the death of a man occupying a high position or status. A tragedy by Shakespeare is concerned chiefly with one man and is a tale of suffering and misfortunes leading to that man’s death and of the deaths of a few others also. The hero must be a man holding a lofty position and commanding respect and the suffering of misfortunes must be of an extraordinary kind so as to produce strong tragic feelings, especially the feelings of pity and terror and awe. Hamletis primarily and chiefly the tragedy of hamlet the prince of Denmark. Hamlet was a well known, honored and well beloved figure in the political life of Denmark of the time at which the incidents of the play are supposed to have taken place. The play depicts the mental suffering and torture which Hamlet endures as a result of what he rightly considers to be the shameless conduct of his mother of the death of his first husband, and in having married this time a man who is in every respect inferior to her first husband. Hamlet subsequently undergoes even greater mental suffering because he finds himself unable to avenge the murder of his father promptly on account of a temperamental drawback and ultimately he dies as a result of the would which is inflicted on him by Laertes, with a poisoned dagger but before dying he stabs the murderer of his father and thus at last takes his revenge. Besides hamlet and the king others who die in this play are Polonius, Ophelia the queen and Laertes.

The Hero , A person of high rank:-

A Shakespearean tragedy may be defined as a story of exceptional calamity leading to the death of a man occupying a high position. Hamlet is primarily and chiefly the tragedy of Hamlet, the prince of Denmark. He was a well-known, honored. He was a well beloved figure in the political life of Denmark. Hamlet’s distress over the conduct of his mother is clearly reflected in his very first soliloquy in which he says:

           

          “How weary, state, flat and unprofitable,

              Seem to me all the uses of this world!”

                In this soliloquy he contrasts his dead father with the present king so excellent a king” the conduct of his mother leads him to this generalization:” frailty, thy name is woman Hamlet’s mental suffering is intensified by the revelation which the ghost makes to him and by the task which the ghost now imposes on him. Unable to avenge the murder of his father promptly because of a temperamental inability, Hamlet should not be allowed to happen. This postponement of his revenge, this irresolution, constitutes a serious flaw in his character and is, as has already been said, chiefly responsible for his tragedy.

The element of fate:-

              It has been pointed out above that although a defect of character is chiefly responsible for the tragic end of the hero, that defect is not solely or wholly responsible for it. Fate or destiny also plays a part in the tragic dramas of Shakespeare. Hamlet certainly produces a feeling in us that there is some mysterious power working in this universe and that this power upsets human hopes, plans and calculations. The very appearance of the ghost in this play is a situation for which fate is responsible. The fact of the late king having been murdered by Claudius is revealed to Hamlet not by any human being but by a spirit from others world. The appearance of the ghost therefore arouses a sense of mystery and creates a feeling that fate is playing a deliberate part in human affairs. The ghost imposes a task on Hamlet. The fact that Hamlet is required to perform that task when he is temperamentally and constitutionally incapable of it is nothing but a manifestation of fate. Commenting on this task, Hamlet says:

                     The time is out of join;-o cursed spite,

                       That ever I was born to set it right!

            Finding hamlet irresolute, fate again intervenes so that Hamlet again sees the ghost, this time in his mother’s closet, and is told by it that it has come to “what they almost blunted in us by the incident of a pirate vessel attacking the ship by which Hamlet is proceeding to England under the command of a pure accident. The course of the story would have been different if fate had not manipulated this encounter between the two ships resulting in Hamlet’s return to Denmark. Finally, the sense of fate in this play receives further emphasis by the words of Hamlet in act V, when he says that there is divini8ty which shapes human ends, and that there is providence even in the fall of a sparrow.

The element of conflict:-

              Conflict is the essence of a Shakespearean tragedy. This conflict is of two types: (a) outward conflict among the various characters and (b) inner conflict in the mind of the hero. Both these types of conflict exist by side in a Shakespearean tragedy. In Hamlet, the out ward conflict takes place between and Claudius. Hamlet seeks to avenge his father’s murder by putting on end to the life of Claudius, while Claudius seeks to get rid of Hamlet in order to ensure his own security and stability. Towards the end of the play an out ward conflict also takes place between Hamlet and Laertes, because Leartes seeks to avenge his own father’s murder by killing Hamlet. The inner conflict takes place in the mind of Hamlet and is revealed to us in Hamlet’s successive soliloquies. The most celebrated of these soliloquies is the one that begins: “to be or not to be –that is the question” which contains perhaps the most agonishing debate in Hamlet’s mind. This inner conflict also appears very poignantly in the soliloquy which begins: “how all occasions do inform against me!” in this soliloquy, Hamlet asks himself whether his failure to avenge his father’s murder is due to an element of cowardice in his nature. He feels greatly dispersed by the thought that he feels lived up to his own notion of honor which demanded that he should put an end to the life of his father’s murderer.

The greatness of the hero and its two fold effect:-

       The tragic heroes of Shakespeare are built on a grand scale. A hero in a Shakespearean tragedy has either nobility of mind or strength of character or, genius, or immense force which in spite of his defect or flaw excites our admiration and sympathy for him. Sense of honor his heart is full of devotion to   his dead father. He has a noble mind. These qualities win him our admiration and sympathy in spite of his lack of a capacity for quick action and his tendency to procrastination. The greatness of a hero in Shakespearean tragedy has two results: (a) since the hero is represented as noble and morally great, the effect of the tragedy is never depressing. We feel that man is not mean or wretched though he may be a victim of suffering and misfortune. A Shakespearean tragedy does not; therefore leave us cynical or desperate. (b) Such greatness perishing and getting destroyed fills us with a sense of waste. Both these results are to be sense in the case of Hamlet. Here the noble character of Hamlet creates in us a feeling of appreciation for the dignity and greatness of human nature. At the same time, a feeling of waste is around in us when we witness that the nobility and greatness of Hamlet come to noting and when we realize what immense good he could have done to his country under different circumstances.

Development in the hero’s character:-

           In a tragedy the hero normally comes to the realization of a truth of which he had been hither to unaware. There is as Aristotle says, “But in Greek tragedy this may be little more than the clearing up of a mistaken identify. Not so with the tragedies of Shakespeare’s maturity. In Hamlet and King Lear, for instance, there is a transformation in the character of the hero. Toward the close of the play Lear is the opposite of what he had pride, and the pomp and circumstance of kingship. To which he had attached great importance, are to him no more than an interesting spectacle. Hamlet is in a state of depression. The world to him is “an unwedded garden” from which he would willingly depart. He has found corruption not only in the state but in existence itself. We soon learn that he had not always been so. Ophelia tells us that he had been the ideal Renaissance prince-soldier, scholar, courtier, etc. and though we catch glimpse of his former self in his conversation with Horatio, his state of depression continues. By the final scene, however his composure has returned. He no longer appears in slovenly dress. He apologizes to Laertes and he treats Claudius with courtesy up to the point at which Gertrude’s death disclose the king’s treachery and compels him to the act of vengeance.

The sense of a moral order:-   

            The fact that in Shakespearean tragedy the hero is to a great extent himself responsible for his misfortunes has an important result. This fact prevents us from getting the impression that there is causeless suffering in the world. On the contrary, we get the feeling that there is a certain moral order in the universe. The suffering of the hero and the magnitude of the disaster that he meets are no doubt out of all proportion to the hero’s fault of character or the error that he commits, but the fact remains that the catastrophe flaws directly from that fault or error. Shakespearean tragedy does not just show “poetic justice”, because poetic justice in drama means pain or merit of a man. In drama means pain or pleasure strictly in accordance with the demerit of merit of a man. In Shakespearean tragedy, the pain or punishment is out of all proportion to the fault or the error. Hamlet’s fault, as we have seen above, is irresolution and his procrastination in avenging his father’s murder. But the mental suffering that he undergoes and the end that he meets are not strictly justified on the basis of that deficiency in his character. Still we are led to believe that Hamlet’s tragic end is to a large extent due to that deficiency or fault. This creates in our minds a feeling that there is some semblance of a moral order in the universe. Other deaths in play are also largely due to error of crimes of the characters themselves. Polonius is killed because he is a meddling and scheming fool. Claudius dies not only because he is the murderer of the late king but also because he has planned the murder of Hamlet not once but twice. Laertes is a victim of the very plot to which under the influence of the king, he became a party.