Tragedy

Growing up I learned about different genres of literature, but after reading Aristotle’s Poetics, and Arthur Miller’s Tragedy and the Common Man, I realized I only grazed the surface of what each genre entailed. To me a comedy was funny, a drama was exciting and emotional, and a tragedy was sad. According to these two writers there is specific criteria that makes a piece of literature a good tragedy. I thought it was interesting to see how each of these writers broke down the components of tragedies, and they changed the way I will read tragedies in the future.

Aristotle listed six elements that are a necessity to tragedies, which are, plot, characters, verbal expression, thought, visual adornment, and song composition. When I think about literature I always just assumed characters were a necessity therefore, I thought it was interesting when I read, “a tragedy cannot exist without a plot, but it can without characters.” After thinking about this statement it made sense because without a plot no message or outcome will be presented to the reader. As he said a tragedy is meant to portray a life, an action, which can be done through the plot and strategic structuring of incidents.

Miller’s comment that stated that it was a misconception that tragedy is associated with pessimism stood out to me. As I stated before I believed this misconception. His explanation as to how tragedies are optimistic is interesting and completely makes sense. The tragic hero’s refusal to stay passive to regain his status or dignity is honorable and optimistic. The next time I read a tragedy I am going to look for the optimism in the literature.

Medea

The play Medea was full of conniving and vicious, acts and thoughts. I couldn’t believe what great lengths Medea would go to seek revenge on her husband. Her plotting and scheming scared me. At the start of the play I was thinking about how separation and remarriage has been apart of our society for centuries. I find it interesting that this tragedy’s initial conflict is based on a husband leaving his wife, and many of today’s movies, books and plays are based on a similar plot. While reading I thought to myself that the words Medea was speaking seemed awfully familiar to me and then I realized it reminded me of the movie The First Wives Club. Similar to Medea, the women in this movie were left by their husbands for younger women and sought revenge for the pain and humiliation their men had caused. One of the women even used her daughter to find out information about her husband, which seemed comparable to Medea using her children to get on Jason’s good side.

The comparison stopped in my mind as soon as I read that Medea was willing to kill her own children to induce pain on her husband. This idea seemed insane to me. I thought it was interesting to see how Medea was willing to kill her children to get what she wanted whereas Creon was willing to die for his daughter because he was so upset she was killed.

Death of a Salesman

Throughout the play I found the relationship between Biff and Willy to be very interesting. Right from the start you know there is tension in their relationship and get a sense of how Willy views Biff. I began to wonder what led them to reach this point in their relationship. After hearing how Willy perceived Biff it was interesting to see how they interacted when Biff was still in high school. It was evident that Biff was Willy’s favorite and really took great interest in him. Willy really built up Biff’s confidence and had great dreams and aspirations as to what Biff would do after high school.

The moment that changed this father son relationship was not revealed until near the end of the play. Biff unintentionally interrupted Willy and his mistress on a business trip, which leads Biff to view his father differently forever. He no longer believes in all the encouragement his father supplied him with throughout high school and feels deceived. After reading about this encounter the animosity between these two made sense. This scene helped me grasp how Willy and Biff think differently. Willy has a warped perception of the world and doesn’t always accept the truth, whereas Biff has a much better sense of reality.

I admired Biff in the last scene of the play. It probably took a lot of courage to finally tell his father how he felt, and reveal his secrets and lies. He knew that even though his brother and father had led a life that was padded with lies, that he would be better off just starting over fresh with everything out in the open.

Fires in the Mirror

I found the play "Fires in the Mirror" to be extremely thought provoking and gave me a new perspective on the Crown Heights crisis. It took me awhile to really get into the play, but overall it was enjoyable. The use of interviews for this show I believe was genius. It truly shows exactly how each person felt and perceived the situation. It was as if I was seeing the same event happen through many different peoples eyes. I found the structure of the play to be very interesting, but at times confusing. For example, at the start of the play I was extremely confused as to what was going on and who exactly was being interviewed. At certain points I felt as if I had grasped what the play writer was trying to convey, but then found myself lost again. The headings gave me some guidance, but it really all came together when I began to read the monologues following the “Crown Heights, Brooklyn, August 1991” heading. While reading, I wondered why the writer ordered the play in this way, and if there was another message I was missing that was expressed through the sequence of these interviews. After concluding the play I had a greater understanding of the relevance of the interviews in the beginning, and how they contributed to the overall message. They set the tone of who lived in this neighborhood, how they identified themselves and the rising tension that would eventually explode into a crisis.

I have read my syllabus and accept the terms of the course