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This article is about the Narratologic concept. For the folk/punk band "Classic Tragic Hero", see Classic Tragic Hero (band).
A tragic hero is an honorable protagonist with a tragic flaw, also known as fatal flaw, which eventually leads to his demise. The concept of the tragic hero was created in ancient Greek tragedy and defined by Aristotle.
Precepts of the tragic hero
An Aristotelian tragic hero must have four characteristics: virtue of birth, nobleness, or wisdom; hamartia (translated as tragic flaw, but connotes more closely to mistakes or excess in behavior than to something innate, related to hubris), and a discovery that is made by his own actions.
In a complex Aristotelian tragedy, the hero undergoes a peripetia, or a turn of fate that leaves him or her destitute, followed by anagnorisis, a point when he or she comes to the realization of his or her errors.
The tragic end of the hero ideally, according to Aristotle, gives the audience catharsis, or emotional purgation.
Some other common traits characteristic of a tragic hero:
- He must suffer more than he deserves.
- He must be doomed from the start, but bear no responsibility for possessing his flaw.
- He must be noble in nature, but imperfect so that the audience can see themselves in him.
- He must have discovered his fate by his own actions, not by things happening to him.
- He must see and understand his doom, as well as the fact that his fate was discovered by his own actions.
- His story should arouse fear and empathy.
- Physically or spiritually wounded by his experiences, often resulting in his death.
- Ideally, he should be a king or leader of men, so that his people experience his fall with him.
Classical tragic hero
The work of Sophocles' Oedipus Rex are regarded by Aristotle as the greatest example of a tragic hero because Oedipus discovered the truth not by chance or divine agency (such as Homer or Euripides), but by his own relentless investigation, a trait shown embedded in himself from the beginning of the play.
Many writers since have tried to follow the idea of Aristotle's tragic hero, but it was during the English Renaissance that Shakespeare introduced a new idea of a tragic hero as dealing not only with a character flaw, but also with moral consequences. Hence, his tragic plays have mostly dealt with the interplay of morality and the thought processes of the tragic heroes. As an example, Hamlet is a tragic hero that fulfills Aristotle's requirements: he suffers more than he deserves, he was doomed from the start, he was noble in nature and also imperfect. However, unlike Sophocles' Oedipus Rex, Shakespeare gives Hamlet an internal thought process that questions himself through soliloquies on morality, delaying, and actions.
Macbeth, also considered a tragic hero, does not fit Aristotle's requirements for suffering more than he deserves, nor was he noble in nature. However, he does fulfill a requirement that the hero chooses his outcome. For example, despite the prophecy of the Weird Sisters predicting Macbeth's ascension as "king thereafter," Macbeth chose to kill Duncan. When the imaginary dagger appeared, he said:
- I see thee yet, in form as palpable
- As this which now I draw.
- Thou marshall'st me the way that I was going;
- And such an instrument I was to use.
Clearly, Macbeth was already set to assassinate Duncan. The dagger did not appear to tell him what to do, since he had already decided. This decision stands in contrast to Oedipus, who tried to avoid his fate, but failed to do so. As such, Shakespeare presents the idea of a moral quandrary by presenting a person who willingly does the wrong things.
Modern tragic heroes
In the Modernist era, a new kind of tragic hero was synthesized as a reaction to the English Renaissance, The Age of Enlightenment, and Romanticism. The idea was that the hero, rather than falling calamity from a high position, is actually a person less worthy of consideration. Not only that, the protagonist may not even have the needed catharsis to bring the story to a close. He may die without an epiphany of his destiny, or suffer without the ability to change events that are happening to him. The story may end without closure and even without the death of the hero. This new tragic hero of Modernism is the anti-hero. A recent claim to the status of a tragic hero is Anakin Skywalker of the Star Wars series. However, George Lucas may have designed Anakin to be an eternal hero, like Gilgamesh and Beowulf, with the guidance of Joseph Campbell, found commonly in many mythologies around the world, rather than a tragic hero. Lucas emphasized the return to the original hero by placing the setting not far in the future, but in the past. *
Two of many examples of the anti-hero in modern literature are Willy Loman from Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller and James Gatz from The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald.
Another example of a modern Greek Tragedy by Arthur Miller is 'A View from the Bridge'. The ways in which it is similar to a Greek Tragedy are plentiful. For example, Greek Tragedies always have a chorus and in 'A View from the Bridge' Alfieri is the chorus. He is detached and yet involved in the action which is exactly what choruses in traditional Greek tragedies did. As well as the play being similar to a Greek tragedy, the main character, Eddie, is similar to a Tragic hero. Here are some similarities: - he is his own undoing, like tragic heroes, as it is his own knife that kills him. - his downfall is inevitable, the ironic telling of Vinny Bolsano at the beginning of the play - He receives more than he deserves; his attempt to protect his niece results in his ostracization - Like tragic heroes, he has a choice to make and is on the brink of two duties - He has a forbidden desire, which is a universal truth - He has a fatal flaw like tragic heroes always do - He realizes his wrong-doing at his death, reconciling with his niece and wife.
Edith Wharton's Ethan Frome is another example of the tragic anti-hero. Ethan, the protagonist, is married to Zeena, but falls in love with Mattie, Zeena's cousin, when she comes over to live with them. As a character, Zeena is sickly and unbendingly cruel. Her coldness to Ethan drives him to Mattie. The love between Mattie and Ethan grows, but they are unable to act on their feelings. The setting in which Ethan and Mattie are trapped, presented as raging winter blizzard that denies both entrance and exit, drives both of them to try to commit suicide by sledding down and hitting an elm tree. A true and cathartic tragedy would have been for both of them to die like Romeo and Juliet, but as this is a story of the anti-hero, Mattie and Ethan continue to live, but crippled. Ethan has a limp, and Mattie is paralyzed from the neck down. Now Zeena has somehow recovered enough from her sickness to take care of them. This reversal of fortune is considered ironic: Ethan used to take care of Zeena but would rather avoid her; by the end of the story, Zeena is taking care of Ethan and Mattie and enjoys being their caretaker.
Moreover, another irony is that winter is over, but Ethan and Mattie remained trapped. This time, it is not the blizzard but their physical conditions that trap them, forever reminding of their mistakes.
See also
"Tragic hero"