Aristotle's Analysis

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Aristotle in his time wrote papers on what he believed the perfect tragedy should be like. He used the work of Sophocles tragedy Oedipus the King as his perfect example of what a tragedy should be compared to. Aristotle felt that Oedipus the King followed his six features of an ideal framework for a flawless tragedy and he wrote, ."..every tragedy has six constituents, which will determine its quality. They are plot, character, diction, thought, spectacle, and song." And from his explanations in of these six features incorporated with perfect examples from Sophocles tragedy it seems that Oedipus the King is the perfectly written tragedy. But I must disagree because I don't believe there should be one pre-structured format for a tragedy and that the format should be developed by one man's opinions.

From reading Oedipus the King I would conclude it is a fine tragedy and can help other writers to see what a good tragedy should be like. From what I read, I feel Aristotle enjoyed Oedipus the King so much that he based all his explanations and features on just this tragedy. I would compare Aristotle to someone in the present day as a person watching a great action movie than deciding that the elements in that action movie can be used as the standard for all action movies to come. This is how I feel reading Aristotle's work and I don't believe any playwright should have to follow the standard format created by an individual.

The thing I noticed about Aristotle and his use of must needed writing devices such as reversal, calamity, and discovery were all surprisingly given examples straight from Oedipus the King. The device reversal that I disagreed with most Aristotle feels is a must in a tragedy. He explains reversal and wrote; "a reversal is a change from one state of affairs to its opposite, one which confirms as I have said, to probability to necessity. In Oedipus for example, the Messenger who came to cheer Oedipus and relieve him of his fear about his mother did the very opposite by revealing to him who he was." So now I am getting the vibe that he feels every tragedy should have a reversal in it to be considered complete. This to me is just ridiculous and shows the example of a person such as Aristotle who is over-involved by his own personal liking of reversal in Oedipus the King and then later decides that every tragedy from their on should include a scene of reversal to be considered appropriate.

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