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5 Ways to Make College Essays About Tragedy More Memorable

By Eric Eng

Difficult and personal topics of tragedy and loss aren’t easy for many people to talk about, let alone write about for others to read. This makes college essays about tragedy challenging for many applicants.

To be sure, a college essay on the death of a parent or death in a family can have a positive impact on a student’s application. The gravity of these subjects makes them impactful, full of emotions, and very captivating for admissions officers. However, a college essay about losing a loved one will only work if they’re done right. Since so many students experience tragedy and loss at some point in their lives, these topics can come across as generic.

Writing About Tragedy in the College Application Essay: Should It Be Done?

When preparing to write a meaningful, personal, and impactful college application essay, something tragic that’s happened in your life might seem like a fitting topic. It’s revealing, emotional, and raw. Well, you’ll hear a variety of different opinions when you ask whether or not painful college essays are a good idea.

Critics of sad college essays say that these subjects can come across as generic since many applicants struggle with similar experiences or issues. Tragedy is a universal phenomenon that humans experience, after all. However, another group will say that these stories are so personal and important that you’re doing yourself a disservice by not writing about them. Sad college essays are a great way to share a life struggle and what you learned from it.

So, what’s the real answer? Should you write a college essay about death or any tragedies? At AdmissionSight , we’ve helped hundreds of students write their winning college application essays, and this is a common topic that we’re asked about. Through our experience, we can confidently say that tragedy and loss are appropriate subjects for your college essay if – and only if – they’re approached carefully and with a clear sense of purpose.

The purpose of college essays about tragedy isn’t to garner sympathy, and a college essay about death or any essay about a tragic event won’t earn you any. If you choose to focus your essay on a tragic event, make sure that you can explain how the tragedy has affected you as a person and what you wish to do with that experience and learnings.

The Right Way to Write About Tragedy in College Application

If you’ve experienced tragedy or loss and wish to address it in your college application essay, you’ll need to approach the topic differently than you would other subjects. These sensitive topics require more tact and care than others. But, when done correctly, they can have a heartfelt impact and make your college application essay truly stand out. Here, we’ll explore some tips on how to write a college essay about losing a loved one or any tragedy.

1. Be open and honest.

When writing college essays about tragedy, some people may feel the need to alter the truth for various reasons. Some worry that being too blunt and open about their experiences might seem too forward, revealing, or uncomfortably raw.

On the other hand, others might feel the need to portray themselves as being more directly affected by the tragedy than they actually were. The ultimate goal is to focus on the aspect of the tragedy that had a lasting impact on you. What challenges have you overcome? How have you changed and grown as a result of the tragedy?

You shouldn’t feel the need to dress your story up or strip it down. Don’t write like you were impacted in ways that you weren’t. This can come across as insincere, and you’d be surprised how easy this is to detect in writing – especially when touching upon such serious topics. You also don’t have to be affected firsthand by a tragic event to have been impacted by it. If something truly affected you, it’ll come through in your writing no matter what happened.

2. Use the right language.

When addressing heavy topics in your college application essay, finding the right balance between authenticity and quality writing can be challenging. The success of your essay depends both on your chosen topic and how well you articulate it.

When writing about tragedy and loss, it’s important to express yourself sincerely while conveying genuine emotions and feelings. This means choosing words that reflect your true experiences and emotions, avoiding clichés, and being honest without being overly dramatic.

Use descriptive language to illustrate your experiences and emotions. Instead of simply stating how you felt, describe specific moments and details that convey your feelings. For example, instead of saying, “I was sad,” you might describe a particular moment that highlights your sorrow.

3. Connect it to the prompt.

Although colleges have essay prompts that are more personal in nature, it’s rare to find a prompt that’s related directly to college essays about tragedy. In general, universities won’t ask students to recount these personal events on their applications. They simply would now want applicants to write sad college essays. However, that doesn’t mean you won’t find plenty of open-ended prompts where these subjects can be appropriate.

In fact, it is common for universities to include questions that ask students to talk about formative experiences in their lives. No matter what kind of prompt you choose, just make sure your story fits the prompt.

For example, let’s say a college application essay prompt is asking you to talk about how you developed an interest in your field of study; perhaps you’re pursuing a degree in the medical field because you had a close friend who died of cancer. Their passing had such an impact on you that you decided to dedicate your life to helping those suffering from the same illness.

While the experience of loss and tragedy adds a powerful element to the response, it’s not the whole answer. It still needs to be connected to the original question. Don’t get so caught up in writing about the event that you forget to respond to the prompt.

4. Focus on yourself.

When you recount a tragic event or loss in your life, it’s often described as something that happened to you. Especially when dealing with losing a loved one, an applicant’s instinct is to focus on the individual rather than themselves. However, when writing college essays about tragedy, students must remember to talk about themselves. It might sound selfish and inappropriate, given the gravity of the event. 

However, admissions officers are interested in learning more about you through your essay. After, it is you who is applying for admission. If you spend the whole time talking about somebody else, you lose the chance to show the admission officers why you need to be accepted and what makes you a good fit for the said school.

How did the tragedy or loss affect you? How did you feel throughout the grieving process? Have you changed permanently since the experience? How is it impacting what you’re doing today? Has it altered your direction or goals in life? These are all pertinent questions that – if applicable to the prompt – should be included in your response.

You want to give admissions officers a glimpse into who you are as a person. That’s why it’s important to focus a good portion of your college essay about death and how this experience impacted you directly.

5. Be respectful.

One of the most important tips on how to approach tragedy and loss in a college essay is with a high level of respect. Some students are hesitant to write about these topics because of how personal and revealing they are. While your name will obviously be on the application, you don’t (and shouldn’t) need to include the names of other people involved in your story.

You can always use fake names to make the response flow better or leave out names altogether. Either way, you’ll want to remain as discreet and anonymous as possible. This isn’t only respectful to others involved, but it also demonstrates tact to admissions officers.

Don’t worry. You’re not going to lose any points for not being specific. Colleges are used to reading these stories. It’s common practice to omit some personal details. Besides, as we mentioned before, the most important part of your story is how you were affected by the process.

Sample College Essays About Tragedy and Loss

Now that we’ve explored some tips for writing college essays about tragedy more effectively for your application, it’s time to look at an actual example. Although the aforementioned tips are incredibly helpful, seeing an example of sad college essays is very informative. Read through this essay carefully and, considering the tips we mentioned, guess what we like so much about it. We’ll explain it in detail in the next section.

Written for the Common App college application essay “Tell us your story” prompt. This essay could work for prompts 1 and 7 for the Common App.

“They covered the precious mahogany coffin with a brown amalgam of rocks, decomposed organisms, and weeds. It was my turn to take the shovel, but I felt too ashamed to dutifully send her off when I had not properly said goodbye. I refused to throw dirt on her. I refused to let go of my grandmother, to accept a death I had not seen coming, to believe that an illness could not only interrupt but steal a beloved life.

When my parents finally revealed to me that my grandmother had been battling liver cancer, I was twelve and I was angry–mostly with myself. They had wanted to protect me–only six years old at the time–from the complex and morose concept of death. However, when the end inevitably arrived, I wasn’t trying to comprehend what dying was; I was trying to understand how I had been able to abandon my sick grandmother in favor of playing with friends and watching TV. Hurt that my parents had deceived me and resentful of my own oblivion, I committed myself to prevent such blindness from resurfacing.

I became desperately devoted to my education because I saw knowledge as the key to freeing myself from the chains of ignorance. While learning about cancer in school, I promised myself that I would memorize every fact and absorb every detail in textbooks and online medical journals. And as I began to consider my future, I realized that what I learned in school would allow me to silence that which had silenced my grandmother. However, I was focused not on learning itself but on good grades and high test scores. I started to believe that academic perfection would be the only way to redeem myself in her eyes–to make up for what I had not done as a granddaughter.

However, a simple walk on a hiking trail behind my house made me open my own eyes to the truth. Over the years, everything–even honoring my grandmother–had become second to school and grades. As my shoes humbly tapped against the earth, the towering trees blackened by the forest fire a few years ago, the faintly colorful pebbles embedded in the sidewalk, and the wispy white clouds hanging in the sky reminded me of my small though nonetheless significant part in a larger whole that is humankind and this Earth. Before I could resolve my guilt, I had to broaden my perspective of the world as well as my responsibilities to my fellow humans.

Volunteering at a cancer treatment center has helped me discover my path. When I see patients trapped in not only the hospital but also a moment in time by their diseases, I talk to them. For six hours a day, three times a week, Ivana is surrounded by IV stands, empty walls, and busy nurses that quietly yet constantly remind her of her breast cancer. Her face is pale and tired, yet kind–not unlike my grandmother’s. I need only to smile and say hello to see her brighten up as life returns to her face. Upon our first meeting, she opened up about her two sons, her hometown, and her knitting group–no mention of her disease. Without even standing up, the three of us—Ivana, me, and my grandmother–had taken a walk together.

Cancer, as powerful and invincible as it may seem, is a mere fraction of a person’s life. It’s easy to forget when one’s mind and body are so weak and vulnerable. I want to be there as an oncologist to remind them to take a walk once in a while, to remember that there’s so much more to life than a disease. While I physically treat their cancer, I want to lend patients emotional support and mental strength to escape the interruption and continue living. Through my work, I can accept the shovel without burying my grandmother’s memory.”

What we like about this essay

We do not often come across college essays about tragedy and loss that hit all the right points. Generally, these essays are too cliche despite their serious contents. Here, we’ll outline some things we loved about this essay and why we chose it as an example of a great college essay about death:

• The writer is able to broach a serious topic such as death, cancer, and the loss of a loved one with positivity and a sense of hope.
• The essay focuses on how the applicant was impacted by the experience more than it does the actual experience itself.
• It includes all of the details needed to convey the message without exceeding the word limit or becoming too focused on the specifics.
• The applicant talks specifically about how their tragic experiences impacted them personally while explaining how they’ll move forward in the future after this change.
• The essay describes how the tragedy and loss affect what they want to study in college, helping admission officers make a connection between this event and the applicant’s plans for university.
• There are enough details and personality without being too revealing to make it uncomfortable or awkward for the reader.

Ultimately, always remember this when trying to write a college essay about losing a loved one: the essay should avoid listing challenges or tragedies without reflecting on how these events have shaped who the student is today. One of the hardest parts of being a college admissions guide is telling someone that their family tragedy alone won’t secure their admission.

Writing sad college essays without hindsight and foresight will never work. However, it can be compelling if the student explains what they learned from such a harrowing experience. Everyone faces challenges, but it’s how these challenges shape a person that truly matters.

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AdmissionSight is the leading college admissions specialist with years of experience successfully helping students like you gain admittance to their chosen universities. Our essay editing services can help you stand out amongst the crowd of applicants, even at top-tier universities.

Contact AdmissionSight to learn more about the services we offer and how we can help you.

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5 moving, beautiful essays about death and dying

by Sarah Kliff

It is never easy to contemplate the end-of-life, whether its own our experience or that of a loved one.

This has made a recent swath of beautiful essays a surprise. In different publications over the past few weeks, I’ve stumbled upon writers who were contemplating final days. These are, no doubt, hard stories to read. I had to take breaks as I read about Paul Kalanithi’s experience facing metastatic lung cancer while parenting a toddler, and was devastated as I followed Liz Lopatto’s contemplations on how to give her ailing cat the best death possible. But I also learned so much from reading these essays, too, about what it means to have a good death versus a difficult end from those forced to grapple with the issue. These are four stories that have stood out to me recently, alongside one essay from a few years ago that sticks with me today.

My Own Life | Oliver Sacks

As recently as last month, popular author and neurologist Oliver Sacks was in great health, even swimming a mile every day. Then, everything changed: the 81-year-old was diagnosed with terminal liver cancer. In a beautiful op-ed , published in late February in the New York Times, he describes his state of mind and how he’ll face his final moments. What I liked about this essay is how Sacks describes how his world view shifts as he sees his time on earth getting shorter, and how he thinks about the value of his time.

Before I go | Paul Kalanithi

Kalanthi began noticing symptoms — “weight loss, fevers, night sweats, unremitting back pain, cough” — during his sixth year of residency as a neurologist at Stanford. A CT scan revealed metastatic lung cancer. Kalanthi writes about his daughter, Cady and how he “probably won’t live long enough for her to have a memory of me.” Much of his essay focuses on an interesting discussion of time, how it’s become a double-edged sword. Each day, he sees his daughter grow older, a joy. But every day is also one that brings him closer to his likely death from cancer.

As I lay dying | Laurie Becklund

Becklund’s essay was published posthumonously after her death on February 8 of this year. One of the unique issues she grapples with is how to discuss her terminal diagnosis with others and the challenge of not becoming defined by a disease. “Who would ever sign another book contract with a dying woman?” she writes. “Or remember Laurie Becklund, valedictorian, Fulbright scholar, former Times staff writer who exposed the Salvadoran death squads and helped The Times win a Pulitzer Prize for coverage of the 1992 L.A. riots? More important, and more honest, who would ever again look at me just as Laurie?”

Everything I know about a good death I learned from my cat | Liz Lopatto

Dorothy Parker was Lopatto’s cat, a stray adopted from a local vet. And Dorothy Parker, known mostly as Dottie, died peacefully when she passed away earlier this month. Lopatto’s essay is, in part, about what she learned about end-of-life care for humans from her cat. But perhaps more than that, it’s also about the limitations of how much her experience caring for a pet can transfer to caring for another person.

Yes, Lopatto’s essay is about a cat rather than a human being. No, it does not make it any easier to read. She describes in searing detail about the experience of caring for another being at the end of life. “Dottie used to weigh almost 20 pounds; she now weighs six,” Lopatto writes. “My vet is right about Dottie being close to death, that it’s probably a matter of weeks rather than months.”

Letting Go | Atul Gawande

“Letting Go” is a beautiful, difficult true story of death. You know from the very first sentence — “Sara Thomas Monopoli was pregnant with her first child when her doctors learned that she was going to die” — that it is going to be tragic. This story has long been one of my favorite pieces of health care journalism because it grapples so starkly with the difficult realities of end-of-life care.

In the story, Monopoli is diagnosed with stage four lung cancer, a surprise for a non-smoking young woman. It’s a devastating death sentence: doctors know that lung cancer that advanced is terminal. Gawande knew this too — Monpoli was his patient. But actually discussing this fact with a young patient with a newborn baby seemed impossible.

"Having any sort of discussion where you begin to say, 'look you probably only have a few months to live. How do we make the best of that time without giving up on the options that you have?' That was a conversation I wasn't ready to have," Gawande recounts of the case in a new Frontline documentary .

What’s tragic about Monopoli’s case was, of course, her death at an early age, in her 30s. But the tragedy that Gawande hones in on — the type of tragedy we talk about much less — is how terribly Monopoli’s last days played out.

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Shakespearean Macbeth as a Tragic Hero Essay

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Greek mythology gave birth to the idea of the tragic hero, in which the concepts of the hero play a tremendous role. Aristotelian thought indicates “the tragic effect will be stronger if the hero is ‘better than we are’, in that he is of higher than ordinary moral worth. Such a man is shown as suffering a change in fortune from happiness to misery because of a mistaken act, to which he is led by his hamartia (his ‘effort of judgment’) or, as it is often literally translated, his tragic flaw” (Zarro, 2001).

There are two types of tragic heroes, those that are born into nobility with a tragic flaw inherent in their character who are therefore responsible for their own fate and doomed to make a serious error in judgment and those who have achieved great heights or esteem through hard work who eventually realize they have made a huge mistake causing them to face and accept their tragic death with honor (Zarro, 2001).

Greek tragedy abounds with examples of tragic heroes, as does much of Shakespearean tragedy. “Shakespeare wished to exhibit a more sublime picture – an ambitious but noble hero, yielding to a deep-laid hellish temptation, and in whom all the crimes to which, in order to secure the fruits of his first crime, he is impelled by necessity, cannot altogether eradicate the stamp of native heroism” (Bates, 1906: 36). In many ways, it can be argued that Macbeth of Shakespeare’s play Macbeth, was a tragic hero.

As the play opens, Macbeth’s nobility of spirit is revealed as reports come in to King Duncan regarding his exploits on the battlefield. The first two acts don’t even see Macbeth as he is busy on the battlefield, attempting to defend Duncan’s kingdom from the forces of Macdonwald, a man from the ‘Western Isles.’ Macbeth’s loyalty is shown in the fierceness of the battle being fought as it is reported by the wounded captain in Act I, Scene ii. He tells the king the battle was “As two spent swimmers that do cling together / And choke their art” (I, ii, 8-9), indicating that the two sides were equally matched and Fortune was favoring Macdonwald. “But all’s too weak / For brave Macbeth (well he deserves that name) / Disdaining Fortune, with his brandished steel … unseamed him from the nave to th’ chops” (I, ii, 15-17, 22).

In addition to fighting for his king, Macbeth is quickly and well rewarded for his efforts as King Duncan makes him the new Thane of Cawdor in addition to his already holding the title of Thane of Glamis. “According to Holinshed, Macbeth’s parents were Sinel, Thane of Glamis (whose existence is otherwise unattested) and a daughter of Malcolm II named Doada (again, modern genealogies mention no such person)” (Friedlander, 2005).

In addition to his supposed genealogy and position of rank, Macbeth himself demonstrates nobility of spirit as he considers the idea of assassinating King Duncan in his own home: “He’s here in double trust: / First, as I am his kinsman and his subject, / Strong both against the deed; then, as his hose, / Who should against his murderer shut the door” (I, vii, 12-15). Beyond this, he also knows that Duncan has been a good and fair king and killing him is unjustified.

However, once the idea that he might be king has entered his brain, thanks to the three witches, Macbeth can’t seem to shake it, particularly as his wife continues to press the issue. “One common form of hamartia in Greek tragedies was hubris, that ‘pride’ or overweening self-confidence which leads a protagonist to disregard a divine warning or to violate an important law” (Zarro, 2001).

Although he knows he has no reason to move against his king other than “vaunting ambition, which o’erleaps itself” (I, vii, 25-27), his commitment to his wife and his greed proves overpowering, forcing him to the act. “Lady Macbeth bitches at her husband and ridicules his masculinity in order to make him commit murder. She talks about a smiling baby she once nursed and what it would have been like to smash its brains out – she would prefer this to having a husband who is unwilling to kill in cold blood” (Friedlander, 2005).

Macbeth’s single evil action of killing his king thus commits him to further evil acts. “That same Macbeth, who once as a warrior could spurn at death, now that he dreads the prospect of the life to come, clings with growing anxiety to his earthly existence the more miserable it becomes, and pitilessly removes out of the way whatever to his dark and suspicious mind seems to threaten danger” (Bates, 1906: 37).

When Macbeth willingly participates in murder, this quickly escalates to massacres of perceived enemies and the propagation of lies and deceits as a means of maintaining the perception others have of him. His own deceit of Duncan forces him to consider the possible schemes of Banquo, thus leading him to order murder once again. In avenge himself on Macduff, he orders the massacre of Macduff’s family, and the evil flows on. In this process, he loses his heath and sanity.

Finally, after having made a mistake in judgment causing a fall from his nobility and high moral station, Macbeth is forced to participate in numerous other actions that continually wear away at his nobility and sanity until he is finally, mercifully, killed by a man who was not born of woman. “Macbeth is still found worthy to die the death of a hero on the field of battle. The noble Macduff is allowed the satisfaction of saving his country by punishing with his own hand the tyrant who had murdered his wife and children” (Bates, 1906: 38).

This, again, is something he has brought on himself as it was Macbeth who ordered the murder of Macduff’s entire household once he learned that Macduff had fled the country in search of justice for Duncan’s murder. “Holinshed spends a lot of time on the incident in which Malcolm (who became a popular king) tests Macduff by pretending to be mean when he is really nice” (Friedlander, 2005), thus establishing the difference between a noble man who would lie and cheat his way to the throne and a noble man who would lie and cheat to determine another’s honesty. In the end, though, Macbeth can be seen to be a tragic hero because he started noble, made a terrible decision based upon his own foolish pride egged on by his ambitious wife and finally died a disgraceful death as the result of his actions.

Works Cited

Bates, Alfred (Ed.). “Macbeth: An Analysis of the Play by Shakespeare.” The Drama: Its History, Literature and Influence on Civilization. London: Historical Publishing Company, 1906, Vol. 14: 34-39.

Friedlander, Ed. “Enjoying Macbeth, by William Shakespeare.” Pathguy. (2005). Web.

Shakespeare. “Macbeth.” William Shakespeare: The Complete Works. Alfred Harbage (Ed.). New York: Viking Books, 1969, pp. 1107-1135.

Zarro, Josephine. “More Terms Defined: Aristotelian Definition of Tragedy.” eGallery of Tragic Heroes in Literature and Life. (2001). Teach the Teachers. Web.

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Tragedy Essays Examples

Type of paper: Essay

Topic: Death , Life , Salesman , Tragedy , Arthur Miller , Accident , Death of a Salesman , Family

Published: 11/28/2020

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Tragedy is a genre rather than an idea. It depicts man as an unwelcome guest in the world and teaches the world that it is better never to have been born. Tragedy underscores the hopelessness of individuals’ attempts to remake the world. It deals with suffering through a series of experiences and conventions of life. Tragedy forces individuals to recognize that they may act against their own interests and that the consequences of their actions deviate disastrously from their hopes and expectations. In other words, tragedy refers to the inescapabilty of suffering and loss. Tragedy enhances any conceivable refinement of misconception, suffrage and loss . It involves pain and pity. The tragedies presented in the two stories, namely, Oedipus the King and Death of a Salesman are both similar and different from each other in various aspects. In spite of a huge difference in the timeline of the two stories, there are several distinguishing facts related to the similarities and differences presented in the plays. The tragedy of Oedipus is the downfall of a prince, while in the Death of a Salesman, it is the common man who falls prey to tragedy. Death of a Salesman involves reality and depicts how a common man desires to end his life unable to withstand the world of deception. Rather than a story between a father and a son, Death of a Salesman describes the importance of forgiveness and recognition . It explains the struggle faced by a family and poses various questions, which are common to arise in the daily life, such as honor, social status, success and recognition. Similarly, Oedipus is a tragedy in which the principal plot depicts Oedipus killing his father. While the story of Oedipus involves playing of the divine and the gods, Death of the Salesman involves the society as the prime holder of the protagonist’s fate. Furthermore, both the plays portray the characters Oedipus and Willy Loman as victims of their circumstances, which are out of their control. While the characters decide not to be in such a position, they have been forced to undergo adverse circumstances by other entities. Finally, both Oedipus and Willy end their fate. Since the actions of Oedipus were his destiny determined by the divine, he had to experience immense pain and suffrage by falling in a relationship with people surrounding him and paying the price of his mistakes . On the other hand, in the Death of a Salesman, Willy had to face suffrage due to a decline in the societal values and moral responsibilities. In this story, the destiny of Willy is he himself rather than the gods and the divine. Both the plays, Oedipus the King and Death of a Salesman are mythic understandings of life. They stand for the cruel contradiction of human existence. Both the plays display emotions for their loved ones and make the audience realize it is the human acts that result in tragic circumstances. While Willy in the Death of a Salesman gets trapped his past and recalls about the flawless moments of both personal and professional life filled with happiness, Oedipus strives to know about his past and intentionally attempts to avoid the relationship between the present and the past . Both the protagonists strive to get a new meaning for their life. One of the major differences of the plays is the way Oedipus and Willy end their lives. Willy ends his life for the insurance money that would help his son achieve his dreams and realizes himself as an ordinary man who broke down unable to live up to the standards of his dreams. On the other hand, Oedipus ends his life by brutally mutilating his eyes so that he would not be able to see the suffrage and pain of his disgrace . Another major difference between the plays is the way the characters blame others for their ignorance. While Willy denies that he is the sole reason for the failure of his son’ dreams and calls Bliff as a lazy and arrogant man in the Death of a Salesman, Oedipus blames Teiresias for not helping Thebes. Throughout his life, Willy boasts about his sales in spite of earning lesser money, which is not even adequate to pay off the debts. On the other hand, Oedipus denies the relationship between his life and the anticipations. While Oedipus’ mother and wife desolate him by committing suicide, Willy abandons his father by ignoring his feelings. Oedipus gets tragically ruined when he finds out the truth that he has children to his mother. Conversely, Willy gets scattered when his son fails to understand him .

Works Cited

Miller, Arthur. Death of a Salesman. Oxford: Heinemann Educational Publishers, 1994. Miller, Arthur. Tragedy and the Common Man. Berkeley, CA: University of California at Berkeley, 1949. Sophocles. Oedipus the King. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 2012.

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• Literary Terms

When & How to Write Tragedy

• Definition & Examples
• When & How to Write Tragedy

How to Write Tragedy

• Start with the hero. The hero is the main element of any tragedy. The hero should be doing well in the beginning – respected, skilled, and usually honorable. But there’s also a key flaw in the hero’s character. Pick a flaw that you feel your readers can relate to, something that they may find in themselves from time to time. Despite the hero’s flaw, the audience should still be rooting for him as they read – otherwise the ending won’t be sad for them.
• Plan out a series of snowballing events. It might start small. The hero might overstep his authority at work due to overconfidence; or she might have a relapse of addiction. But from the first event, something else happens, which then leads to something else, and slowly the negative events start to spiral out of control.
• Begin with the end in mind. In terms of structure, the most important part of a tragedy is its ending. The ending has to show the hero’s final destruction, usually (but not always) meaning death. You should have an ending in mind as you write, so that you have some idea of what you’re building up to. How will your hero be destroyed? What fatal flaw will result in the catastrophe? And how will you describe the end so that readers feel the sad and pitiable emotions of pathos?

When to Use Tragedy

Tragedy is a kind of story structure, so it’s most relevant to creative writing. However, tragedies also need space to develop – you can’t write one overnight, or within the space of just a couple of pages. So if you’re going to write a tragedy for a creative writing class, you should make sure you start way ahead of time and that you’re prepared to write a pretty long piece with a gradual story arc from beginning to tragic end. If you’re writing your tragedy outside of class, of course, you won’t need to worry about deadlines and can give the piece the time and attention that it needs to become a really great tragedy.

Although tragedy is generally used in literature, it can also be a useful concept in essays , especially biographical essays. A good biography needs to take a particular viewpoint on the person in question, and it helps to have an overall narrative structure. Tragedy fits both requirements: it gives you a structure for the piece, and also helps guide how you portray the subject. You might argue, for example, that Napoleon was a tragic figure whose fatal flaw was hubris (see Related Terms ).

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• Introduction
• Aeschylus: the first great tragedian
• Sophocles: the purest artist
• Euripides: the dark tragedian
• Later Greek drama
• The long hiatus
• Marlowe and the first Christian tragedy
• Shakespearean tragedy
• From comedy to tragedy
• Shakespeare’s tragic art
• Decline in 17th-century England
• Corneille and Racine
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• Dostoyevsky’s tragic view
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• Loss of viability in the West
• Classical theories
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• What did Sophocles do?
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• Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy - Tragedy
• Oregon State University - College of Liberal Arts - What is Tragedy? || Definition and Examples
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tragedy , branch of drama that treats in a serious and dignified style the sorrowful or terrible events encountered or caused by a heroic individual. By extension the term may be applied to other literary works, such as the novel .

Although the word tragedy is often used loosely to describe any sort of disaster or misfortune, it more precisely refers to a work of art that probes with high seriousness questions concerning the role of man in the universe. The Greeks of Attica , the ancient state whose chief city was Athens , first used the word in the 5th century bce to describe a specific kind of play , which was presented at festivals in Greece . Sponsored by the local governments , these plays were attended by the entire community , a small admission fee being provided by the state for those who could not afford it themselves. The atmosphere surrounding the performances was more like that of a religious ceremony than entertainment. There were altars to the gods, with priests in attendance, and the subjects of the tragedies were the misfortunes of the heroes of legend , religious myth , and history. Most of the material was derived from the works of Homer and was common knowledge in the Greek communities . So powerful were the achievements of the three greatest Greek dramatists— Aeschylus (525–456 bce ), Sophocles (c. 496–406 bce ), and Euripides (c. 480–406 bce )—that the word they first used for their plays survived and came to describe a literary genre that, in spite of many transformations and lapses, has proved its viability through 25 centuries.

Historically, tragedy of a high order has been created in only four periods and locales: Attica, in Greece, in the 5th century bce ; England in the reigns of Elizabeth I and James I , from 1558 to 1625; 17th-century France ; and Europe and America during the second half of the 19th century and the first half of the 20th. Each period saw the development of a special orientation and emphasis, a characteristic style of theatre . In the modern period, roughly from the middle of the 19th century, the idea of tragedy found embodiment in the collateral form of the novel .

This article focusses primarily on the development of tragedy as a literary genre . For information on the relationship of tragedy to other types of drama, see dramatic literature . The role of tragedy in the growth of theatre is discussed in Western theatre .

Development

Origins in greece.

The questions of how and why tragedy came into being and of the bearing of its origins on its development in subsequent ages and cultures have been investigated by historians, philologists, archaeologists, and anthropologists with results that are suggestive but conjectural. Even the etymology of the word tragedy is far from established. The most generally accepted source is the Greek tragōidia , or “goat-song,” from tragos (“goat”) and aeidein (“to sing”). The word could have referred either to the prize, a goat , that was awarded to the dramatists whose plays won the earliest competitions or to the dress (goat skins) of the performers, or to the goat that was sacrificed in the rituals from which tragedy developed.

In these communal celebrations, a choric dance may have been the first formal element and perhaps for centuries was the principal element. A speaker was later introduced into the ritual , in all likelihood as an extension of the role of the priest, and dialogue was established between him and the dancers, who became the chorus in the Athenian drama. Aeschylus is usually regarded as the one who, realizing the dramatic possibilities of the dialogue , first added a second speaker and thus invented the form of tragedy. That so sophisticated a form could have been fully developed by a single artist, however, is scarcely credible. Hundreds of early tragedies have been lost, including some by Aeschylus himself. Of some 90 plays attributed to him, only seven have survived.

Four Dionysia , or Bacchanalia , feasts of the Greek god Dionysus (Bacchus), were held annually in Athens . Since Dionysus once held place as the god of vegetation and the vine, and the goat was believed sacred to him, it has been conjectured that tragedy originated in fertility feasts to commemorate the harvest and the vintage and the associated ideas of the death and renewal of life. The purpose of such rituals is to exercise some influence over these vital forces. Whatever the original religious connections of tragedy may have been, two elements have never entirely been lost: (1) its high seriousness, befitting matters in which survival is at issue and (2) its involvement of the entire community in matters of ultimate and common concern. When either of these elements diminishes, when the form is overmixed with satiric, comic, or sentimental elements, or when the theatre of concern succumbs to the theatre of entertainment, then tragedy falls from its high estate and is on its way to becoming something else.

As the Greeks developed it, the tragic form, more than any other, raised questions about human existence. Why must humans suffer? Why must humans be forever torn between the seeming irreconcilable forces of good and evil, freedom and necessity, truth and deceit? Are the causes of suffering outside of oneself, in blind chance, in the evil designs of others, in the malice of the gods? Are its causes internal, and does one bring suffering upon oneself through arrogance , infatuation, or the tendency to overreach? Why is justice so elusive ?

Oedipus by Sophocles: a Tragic Hero

This essay about Oedipus in Sophocles’ “Oedipus Rex” positions him as the quintessential tragic hero, exploring the themes of human nature, fate, and the quest for truth. Through Oedipus’ story of unintentional self-destruction—fulfilling a prophecy by killing his father and marrying his mother—Sophocles sheds light on the complexities of human existence and the inevitable encounter with destiny. The narrative doesn’t just focus on Oedipus’ downfall but emphasizes his humanity, resilience, and the profound burden of awareness he carries. It underlines the character’s relatability through his flaws, making his tale resonate with the struggles inherent in the human condition. The essay reflects on how Oedipus’ tale is not merely a story of tragedy but a reflection on the courage required to face harrowing truths, making it a timeless piece that explores the essence of being human and the indomitable spirit of the tragic hero.

How it works

In the grand and often bewildering theater of literature, where characters both mighty and meek vie for our attention, the tragic hero holds a special place in our hearts and imaginations. Sophocles’ Oedipus, the beleaguered king of Thebes, is one of those characters who’s hard to forget once you’ve met him. Through the story of “Oedipus Rex,” Sophocles doesn’t just tell us a tale from a bygone era; he holds up a mirror to the human condition, reminding us of our perpetual struggle against the odds.

Oedipus is a man on a mission. Determined to rid Thebes of a devastating plague, he ends up uncovering a web of truths that eventually leads to his own undoing. The prophecy that haunted his cradle—killing his father and marrying his mother—unravels despite his best efforts to dodge destiny. It’s this journey, fraught with good intentions and tragic missteps, that cements Oedipus as the epitome of a tragic hero. His story isn’t just about the pitfalls of fate; it’s a deep dive into the human psyche, our fears, and the lengths we’ll go to for the truth.

But Sophocles’ genius lies not in making us mere spectators of Oedipus’ downfall. Instead, he invites us to walk alongside Oedipus, to feel his determination, his despair, and ultimately, his acceptance of his fate. Oedipus isn’t a hero because he triumphs; he’s a hero because he embodies the resilience of the human spirit in the face of insurmountable odds. His tale doesn’t just tug at our heartstrings; it raises questions about free will, knowledge, and the human capacity for suffering and redemption.

What makes Oedipus stand out in the crowded arena of tragic heroes isn’t just his tragic flaw or his downfall; it’s his humanity. His pride, his mistakes, and his quest for truth make him relatable. He’s not diminished by his errors; instead, they render him more human, more like us. The tragedy of Oedipus is not just in the sequence of events leading to his exile but in the burden of awareness he’s forced to bear. His journey towards this harrowing enlightenment, towards facing the truth no matter how ugly, is where his heroism truly lies.

The enduring appeal of Oedipus’ story is a tribute to Sophocles’ understanding of the human heart and his ability to weave a narrative that’s as relevant now as it was in ancient Greece. Through Oedipus, Sophocles explores with a tender yet unflinching gaze, the themes that define our existence: fate, the search for truth, and the enduring human spirit. Oedipus’ saga resonates with us because it is, at its core, a reflection of our own fears, aspirations, and the eternal struggle for meaning and identity in a world that often seems governed by capricious fates.

So, as we turn the last page of “Oedipus Rex,” we’re left with more than just a story of a king’s fall from grace. We’re reminded of the power of narrative to delve into the essence of what it means to be human. Oedipus remains a beacon of the tragic hero archetype, not just for the magnitude of his suffering, but for his courage in confronting it. His tale, etched by Sophocles’ hand, continues to echo through the ages, a poignant reminder of literature’s ability to capture the beauty and tragedy of the human experience.

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Literary Theory and Criticism

Home › Drama Criticism › Tragedy: An Introduction

Tragedy: An Introduction

By NASRULLAH MAMBROL on July 23, 2018 • ( 0 )

The word ‘tragedy’ in common usage today means little more than a sad or unnecessarily unpleasant event: a motorway crash in which several people died is described as a ‘tragedy’ in the newspapers; a promising career cut short by cheating is described as ‘tragic’. But in drama, the term ‘tragedy’ is specific, even technical, and refers to a particular type of play.

Discussion of tragedy as a dramatic form must begin with the Greek scholar and philosopher, Aristotle (384–22 BCE). In his small book – perhaps it is no more than lecture notes – known as The Poetics, he attempts a dispassionate, intellectual examination of poetry, focusing especially on drama, and within drama on tragedy. He never saw the plays of Aeschylus (c.525–456 BCE), Sophocles (c.496–06 BCE) and Euripides (c.485–07 BCE) – but he read them closely and tried to draw conclusions about what typifies their works.

Aristotle begins his examination with the assertion that poetry, like the other arts, is an ‘imitation’ of life. By this, he does not mean that poetry, or the arts in general, merely imitate the surface experience of living day-to-day; he means that art reproduces the rhythms of life, it creates experiences which, if we enter into them, are like the experiences of life. The sensitive spectator at a good performance of Shakespeare’s As You Like It has an experience something like ‘falling in love’: the play imitates falling in love. The appreciative listener at a concert performance of Beethoven’s Eroica symphony experiences something like heroism, pride, elation or triumph. For Aristotle , the purest form of poetic imitation is drama, and the purest form of drama is tragedy.

Aristotle says that: ‘Tragedy is an imitation of an action that is admirable, complete and possesses magnitude; in language made pleasurable . . . performed by actors . . . effecting through pity and fear the purification of such emotions’ (Aristotle, Poetics, p. 10).

This general definition, especially the last clause, raises serious issues which have been debated heatedly over centuries, and even millennia, and to which we shall return. Before we enter that debate, however, we should note Aristotle’s further observations.

He lists six elements of tragedy, as follows :

1 Plot, that is the action, the story, which, he adds, is enacted by people, actors, as opposed to be being narrated or sung.

2 Character, the way a person behaves (for behaviour defines character); it is important to note that tragedy, according to Aristotle, deals with ‘the better type of person’, that is royalty, generals, governors, people whose fate is of significance to more than just themselves;

3 Reason, the way plot and character are connected, the logic and coherence of what is presented, how what is shown is ‘likely to happen’.

4 Diction, the speaking of the text.

5 Poetry, the poetic qualities of the text itself.

6 Spectacle, what you see on the stage.

For Aristotle, the most important of these is the plot, which is the imitation of action, the way the events, or incidents, are organised by the playwright. The primacy of plot over the other elements is well established:

Tragedy is not an imitation of persons, but of actions and of life. Wellbeing and ill-being reside in action, and the goal of life is an activity, not a quality; people possess certain qualities in accordance with their character, but they achieve well-being or its opposite on the basis of  how they fare . . . So the events, i.e. the plot, are what tragedy is there for, and that is the most important thing of all. (Aristotle, Poetics , p. 11)

Aristotle argues that it would be possible to have a tragedy which contained action but no characters, but it would be impossible to have a tragedy which included characters but no action. Action, it may be noted, is a very wide term, and includes reaction (how characters react to events), for instance, as well as suffering, amusement, fear, and so on.

The action imitated, says Aristotle , evokes and purifies the emotions of fear and pity. ‘Purification’ is a translation of the vexed Greek word, katharsis. Katharsis was originally a medical term which referred to the way the body gets rid of poison or other harmful matter. Sometimes, with reference to drama, it has been translated as a purging of fear and pity. The concept is elusive, but it appears to contain within it for the spectator both fear (‘that could have been me’), and pity (the sorrow we feel for another person in misfortune). And after the event, when the tragedy has closed, we feel cleansed, purged, by the experience. It is this cleansing that tragedy performs which defines the genre for Aristotle. And paradoxically, the moment of katharsis (when we weep) is pleasurable.

Katharsis is the crux of Aristotle’s view of tragedy. This is what makes tragedy distinct from any other art form. It is also what makes it uniquely powerful.

Since tragedy imitates action to evoke fear and pity, plot is its most important element. But the plot is not simply a series of actions bundled up together piecemeal. The arrangement of the incidents is crucial to the tragedy. There are two qualities by which an effective plot may be recognised: first, it must be complete in itself, whole and self-contained; and second, it must have a clear structure, a beginning, a middle and an end. This may not be as simple as it sounds, as different tellings of the story of Oedipus demonstrate.

Two Oedipuses

First version

Once there was a king of Thebes called Laius, who married a woman called Jocasta, and they had a son called Oedipus. Apollo’s oracle foretold that this boy would kill his father and marry his mother. Laius and Jocasta decided to cheat the oracle: the child would have to die. But rather than become infanticides, they gave the child to a shepherd to leave on the mountainside with its ankles tied together.

However, the shepherd was tender-hearted and gave the baby to another shepherd from Corinth, who promised to bring it up as his own. But in fact he took it to the king of Corinth, who had no children, and who now adopted Oedipus as his son.

Oedipus grew up believing he was the son of the king and queen of Corinth. When he was eighteen, he was told by Apollo’s oracle that he would kill his father and marry his mother. Oedipus decided to cheat the oracle: he left Corinth and swore never to return till his parents were dead.

He wandered though the world, and once, at a crossroads, he met an arrogant old man who tried to whip him. Oedipus killed him, and his three servants. He wandered on till he came to Thebes – a stricken city whose king had been killed, and whose crops had failed. Moreover, Thebes was being terrorised by the Sphinx, who killed anyone unable to answer its riddle: What walks on four legs in the morning, two legs at noon, and three legs in the evening? The answer – humans, who crawl before they can walk, and who need a stick in old age – was given by Oedipus, who thereby freed the city from its curse. By acclamation, Oedipus was made king of Thebes, and he married the old king’s widow.

For fifteen years, Thebes enjoyed prosperity, and Oedipus and Jocasta had children. Then plague and famine struck again. Oedipus swore to find out the cause of the new disasters, and sent for Tiresias, the blind prophet. Tiresias riddlingly implied that the cause lay with Oedipus himself. Then Jocasta told of how her first husband, Laius, had been murdered at a crossroads by a stranger. Oedipus recognised himself in the story. He sent for the old shepherd, who confirmed what had happened. Horrified, Jocasta committed suicide, and Oedipus blinded himself.

Second version

Thebes is beset by famine and plague. The king, Oedipus, determines he will discover why Thebes is suffering, and promises to punish whoever is responsible.

The blind prophet, Tiresias, implies that Oedipus himself is responsible. Oedipus suspects that Creon, Jocasta’s brother, has put Tiresias up to this, because he (Creon) wants the throne. Oedipus confronts Creon, but Jocasta is able to still their argument by referring to her child with Laius, and telling them of Laius’ murder.

Oedipus is frightened by this revelation. He sends for the shepherd, and while waiting for him talks of his own childhood in Corinth, and the oracle which had foretold how he would kill his father and marry his mother. He reveals how he had tried to cheat the oracle, and how he had killed a man at the crossroads.

Unexpectedly, a messenger arrives with news that the king of Corinth, Oedipus’ supposed father, has died, and of natural causes. Oedipus rejoices that the oracle’s prophecy has not come true. But then the messenger reveals that Oedipus is not in fact the king of Corinth’s son. Jocasta tries to intervene, but Oedipus is adamant for the truth.

The shepherd arrives and tells his story. Oedipus and Jocasta both rush away, only for an attendant shortly afterwards to bring the news that Jocasta has committed suicide and Oedipus blinded himself. The sightless Oedipus now makes his peace with Creon. His daughters bid him goodbye, and he goes into exile. ‘Your rule is ended’, says Creon.

The two stories are largely the same, but the versions are very different. The first version, which we may call the fable, perhaps arouses curiosity, a desire to know what will happen next. The second version, which is effectively the plot of Sophocles ’ tragedy, arouses emotions, perhaps fear and pity, and is the more likely of the two versions to ‘grip’ us.

The reasons for this are clear. The most obvious perhaps concerns the focus in the telling. The action is much more tightly focused in the second version, the tragedy, than it is in the fable. It is self-contained, and its references are organic to the story. Thus, it does away with the Delphic oracle as a character, and also the Sphinx. These may be interesting in themselves, but they do not assist directly in the arousal of pity and fear. The focus also applies to time. Whereas the fable covers twenty or thirty years, Sophocles’ plot takes less than a day. And similarly with place: the fable wanders all over the eastern Mediterranean, but the plot of the tragedy is confined wholly to Thebes.

The two versions may also be compared in terms of their structure. Structurally, the fable is something of a shambles! It jogs along with plenty of strong events – the handing over of the baby, the death at the crossroads, the confrontation with the Sphinx, and more – but it has little shape. The tragedy, on the other hand, is very tightly structured, with a beginning, a middle and an end. The beginning of the tragedy sees the city beset with plague and famine, and the good ruler determined to help his people. The end brings the solution to this problem: Oedipus himself is the problem, which is solved by his blinding and exile, and Jocasta’s suicide. The rhythm of the tragedy is long and strong, whereas the rhythm of the fable is more broken and certainly less oppressive.

The middle section of the tragedy, how the plot develops from the beginning to the end, illustrates the point about rhythm: it may be seen as a straight line driving inexorably towards the conclusion. Certainly, nothing is extraneous. In fact, the middle may be divided into three sections: first, the scenes with Tiresias and Creon, which deal with politics, power and the significance of the problem; second the almost-domestic scenes between Oedipus and Jocasta, in which their pasts are revealed; and third, the scenes with the messenger and the shepherd, in which we learn the truth. It is notable how the first and third sections of the middle balance one another, like two sides of a seesaw poised over the pivot of the scenes between Oedipus and his mother/wife.

We may conclude, therefore, that while the fable behind any plot is likely to be chronological or sequential, the plot itself may jump about, may include flashbacks or omit details, and so on. The plot is the way in which the author treats the fable.

Oedipus the King by Sophocles is an example of what Aristotle considered a successful plot. He believed that tragedy depicted a change of fortune, either from bad to good fortune, or, more likely, from good to bad fortune. The latter, he thought, was the most common and best sort of tragedy, and today tragedy is regarded as dealing almost exclusively with a change from good fortune to bad.

The change of fortune must come about logically, Aristotle also observed, through a connected series of events which follow ‘necessarily’ or are ‘likely’; in other words, they are believable. The function of the playwright or poet is not to say what has happened, but what could happen. Aristotle allocated a special significance to plot devices which helped to intensify the focus, such as ‘recognition’ and ‘reversal’. Examples of these come from Oedipus: first, when the messenger brings news that the king of Corinth has died naturally, Oedipus knows more (‘recognition’), but when he adds that Oedipus is not the king of Corinth’s son, relief gives way to deeper despair (‘reversal’).

If Aristotle ’s views on tragedy have been the most influential, they are by no means the only ones. For instance, he says little or nothing about the profound sense of loss or emptiness we can sometimes feel at the performance of a tragedy. Nor does he notice, as have later critics, that tragedy almost always deals with the protagonist’s private world, and that fear and pity seem to be at their most powerful when they occur in family situations. In the Renaissance, tragedy was often considered to be a kind of warning to princes: it depicted the fall of those who abused their power (‘When the bad bleed, then is the tragedy good.’). Sir Philip Sidney (1554–86), Jean Racine (1639–99), John Dryden (1631–1700), Georg Hegel (1770–1831) and Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) are among many critics and philosophers of earlier ages who have addressed the question of tragedy, and the literature on tragedy has grown enormously in the last hundred years.

The German philosopher, Georg Hegel , believed that tragedy was the result of the clash between mutually exclusive but equally justifiable causes, such as that between Creon and Antigone in Sophocles’ Antigone , or that created by the requirement that Hamlet avenge his father, while not committing murder.

Friedrich Nietzsche refined and extended this. In The Birth of Tragedy , he asserted first that art was a unique synthesis of dream and intoxication, order and chaos, embodied in the Greek gods, Apollo and Dionysus. Apollo is self-aware, calm, the god of light, and the individual; Dionysus is the god of wine, drunkenness, self-forgetfulness and revelry. If Apollo is the guardian of each person’s uniqueness, Dionysus unites people and makes them one with nature. Somewhere in the union of these two opposites, Apollo and Dionysus, or in the dialectical clashes between them, Nietzsche argued, tragedy is born.

For Nietzsche, Prometheus, not Oedipus, is the archetypal tragic hero: Prometheus stole fire from heaven to warm and illuminate humankind, for which he was punished eternally. In his ending Nietzsche finds the justice which he asserts tragedy must uphold, for the endless suffering of the hero is matched by the extreme plight of the gods themselves, on the brink of their extinction brought about by the action of the hero. The suffering in both worlds provokes the oneness of heaven and earth, and points to an eternal justice above both gods and humans. In this view, the hero is a ‘great soul’ who will always, inevitably, strive for what is highest. Prometheus is Dionysian as he strives to unite people, to bring together people and nature, but in doing this he also asserts his Apollonian individualism, his self-centredness. Our humanity is realised only in communion with the world and with people, but we can only reach this distant goal in moments of supreme selfawareness. This, Nietzsche insists, is why tragedy is ennobling, profound and moving.

Nietzsche’s The Birth of Tragedy gave George Steiner (b. 1929) the title for his work on the subject, The Death of Tragedy (published in 1961). Arguing that tragedy depended on a metaphysical view of the world, Steiner suggested that modern rationalism, the result of work by scientific thinkers like Copernicus (1473–1543), Darwin (1809–82) and Freud (1856–1939) had destroyed the basis for true tragedy. We no longer believe in humanity’s innate potential for greatness, more especially since the outrages of Nazism and Stalinism, and only the egotistical or the ignorant aspire to tragic status.

This view was countered by, among others, the American playwright Arthur Miller (1915–2005), who attempted to create in his plays heroes who could be called tragic. In Miller’s words, each of his significant heroes was prepared to lay down his life to secure ‘his sense of personal dignity’. Miller’s heroes have an almost Nietzschean will to life, to achieve their humanity, and indeed there have been enough playwrights in the last 150 years to refute the pessimistic notion that tragedy is dead: Henrik Ibsen, Eugene O’Neill (1888–1953) and Federico Garcia Lorca (1898–1936) are three significant modern tragic playwrights.

Tragedy is, perhaps, the supreme philosophical dramatic form. It asks, Why we are here? What is the point of life in a corrupt and corrupting world? Does death have significance? Does suffering bring wisdom? Can we – or should we – challenge Fate? Are we free?

Source: Leach, Robert. Theatre Studies, The Basics  Taylor & Francis, 2013.

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Categories: Drama Criticism , Literature

Tags: Aeschylus , An Introduction to Tragedy , Antigone , Aristotle , Arthur Miller , Creon , Drama Criticism , Euripides , Friedrich Nietzsche , George Steiner , History of Tragedy , History of Tragic Plays , Introduction to Tragedy , Jocasta , Katharsis , Literary Criticism , Literary Theory , Oedipus Rex , Oedipus the King , Poetics , six elements of tragedy , Sophocles , The Birth of Tragedy , The Death of Tragedy , Theatre Studies , Tiresias , Tragedy an Outline , Tragedy: An Introduction , What is Tragedy

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Home / Essay Samples / Literature / Literary Genres / Tragic Hero

Tragic Hero Essay Examples

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About Tragic Hero

A tragic hero is a character in a dramatic tragedy who has virtuous and sympathetic traits but ultimately meets with suffering or defeat. Something tragic is sadly disastrous, such as the untimely death of a loved one. A hero is someone who has accomplished special achievements and is viewed as a role model for others.

Is a male character, usually a noble, who suffers a reversal of fortune. Makes a consequential mistake. Experiences a downfall as a result of his hubris (excessive pride) Typically dies in the end. Sparks sympathy and fear in the audience.

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