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Gowher Ahmad Naik, Lovely Professional University Unit 2: Aristotle: The Poetics: Introduction, Tragedy

Unit 2: Aristotle: The Poetics: Introduction, Tragedy Notes

CONTENTS
Objectives

Introduction
2.1 Concept of Tragedy
2.2 Chapter-wise Critical Summary of ‘The Poetics’
2.3 Summary
2.4 Key-Words
2.5 Review Questions
2.6 Further Readings

Objectives

After reading this Unit students will be able to:
• Discuss Aristotle’s Definition of Tragedy.
• Understand the text ‘The Poetics’.

Introduction

The Poetics must have been penned by Aristotle after he settled as teacher and investigator in
Athens about 335 B.C., and before he left Athens in 324 B.C. It is a short treatise of twenty-six
chapters and forty-five pages, neither exhaustive and comprehensive, nor yet a coherent study of
the subject with which it deals. It does not seem to be a work intended for publication. It does not
say much about Comedy, touches rather briefly on the epic, and the renewed concept of Catharsis
has not been fully developed or explained. It is a lopsided work, concerned mainly with Greek
philosopher’s theory of tragedy.
The word tragedy can be applied to a genre of literature. It can mean ‘any serious and dignified
drama that describes a conflict between the hero (protagonist) and a superior force (destiny,
chance, society, god) and reaches a sorrowful conclusion that arouses pity or fear in the audience.’
From this genre comes the concept of tragedy, an idea based on the possibility that a person may
be destroyed precisely because of the attempt to be good. (Irony, therefore, is essential and it is not
surprising that dramatic irony, which can so neatly emphasize irony, is common in tragedies.)
Tragedy implies a conflict between human goodness and reality. Many scholars feel that if God
rewards goodness either on earth or in heaven there can be no tragedy. If in the end each person
gets what he or she deserves, tragedy is impossible. Tragedy assumes that this universe is rotten
or askew. Christians believe that God is good and just, hence, for certain scholars tragedy is
logically impossible. Of course a possible variation of the tragic concept would allow a character
to have a fault which leads to consequences far more dire than he deserves. But tragic literature is
not intended to make people sad. It may arouse pity and fear for the suffering protagonist, or for
all humanity, especially ourselves. But usually it also is intended to inspire admiration for the
central character, and by analogy for all mankind.
Aristotle’s The Poetics is a lop-sided work. Most of it is devoted to the consideration of Tragedy in
all its aspects and constituent parts, and the Epic and the Comedy are treated only cursorily.
Chapters VI-XXII, seventeen chapters out of twenty-six, are devoted exclusively to a discussion of

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