Aristole's View on Drama

Preamble

Drama is an aspect of literature represented in performances and has been a part of the world for many decades. Drama originated in classical Greece around the fifth century B.C. The earliest performances took place in amphitheaters, which the Greeks invented to incorporate plays in their religious and civic festivals. These Greek festivals were huge theatrical events filled with three days of drama. The structure of the amphitheater allowed for an audience of thousands to observe the theatrics and watch as the actors vie to win the drama competition. In addition, ancient Greek theater used dramas to relay moral and political messages to their communities.

There are two different categories of drama: comedy and tragedy. Greek theater used two masks known as Thalia (comedy mask) and Melpomene (tragedy mask) to symbolize these two types. In a general sense comedy and tragedy differ only in there endings. For instance both comedies and tragedies can have moments of laughter and sadness, but comedies end happy while tragedies end very sad. While both genres of drama have greatly influenced theater as we know it today, Greek tragedy is better known as having a more important part in modern history. This is because tragic plays portray many issues still plaguing society’s today. Although societies develop through the ages, the people who make up the societies will always have the same faults, desires, consequences; and in a broad sense this is what tragedies portray.

Aristotle was a famous philosopher during the Greek period. Aristotle’s poetics are his collection of writings addressing different type’s literary theory, including tragic theory. In these writings Aristotle provided the following definition of tragedy, “Tra...

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...ealously. However when Iago reminds Othello how Desdemona was able to deceive her father, Othello’s demeanor began to change. Othello then starts to question if Desdemona could have every truly loved a moor which in turn destroyed his self-esteem. Eventually Iago provided circumstantial evidence of Desdemona’s cheating to Othello by stealing her handkerchief and planting on her assumed lover. When Othello sees this he becomes consumed by jealousy and ultimately kills Desdemona. As Desdemona laid lifeless on the bed Othello began to realize Iago’s deceit. Othello states, “Speak of me as I am… Of one who loved not wisely, but too well / Of one not easily jealous, but being wrought, / perplex’d in the extreme”. It is in this moment where the audience sees Othello recognizing that his wife had been faithful and that his fatal flaw is to blame for his downward spiral.