Since a blog has not been done yet about Tragedy, I am going to do it. William Shakespeare’s Hamlet is a perfect example of a tragedy. I used to think that a tragedy had only to do with the end being sad. Little did I know that there was more to it! A tragedy has to have a main character who is at a royal status, or at least pretty high up there. Hamlet happens to be a prince, so that works out perfectly. He has a long ways to fall during his tragic downfall. Basically everyone in a tragedy dies and so far in Hamlet we have seen the death of Old Hamlet, Polonius, and Ophelia. A tragedy also is a house for supernatural incidents. At the beginning of the play, Hamlet sees a ghost of his late father, who tells Hamlet to avenge him. Revenge, not surprisingly, is also a common element among tragedies.
In class these past few days we have been in the midst of reading one of Shakespeare's most famous tragedies, Hamlet. Since the last blogger wrote, we haven't learned much additional information in class. Today we talked a bit about theme and what the theme is in Hamlet. Theme is expressible in the form of a statement, and should have a subject. Theme is also a generalization about life and should not generalize life outside of the story. And under no circumstances should theme be a cliché. Common themes in Hamlet are death, revenge and madness/insanity.
The reader can pick up some of the major themes in Hamlet by the poetic structures that Shakespeare uses. He ends most scenes or soliloquies with a heroic couplet, which signals to the reader that it is an important part. At the end of scene 3 act 1, Hamlet uses a heroic couplet to talk about his revenge that he is to take on his uncle. "Foul deeds will rise, Though all the earth o'erwhelm them, to men's eyes." Revenge happens to be a major theme throughout Hamlet.
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10 comments:
Senia Lee
I agree with you Jeanne. I didn't really know much about tragedy. I also thought it was simply just sad elements in a story, but I now know there are a lot of components of tragedy. I also think it is hard to come up with a theme statement because there are multiple events that could make up the theme of the story like death or revenge.
Brian Reuland
Jeanne and Senia are right. Besides a reading Romeo and Juliet in 9th grade, we haven't been exposed to much tragedy, and even then we learned more about Shakespeare and poetic structure than about tragedy. Also, there are so many theme statements that could be said in Hamlet, it is hard to choose one. If I had to though, I'd say something about death and how it equalizes all memebers of society.
Quinn Jacobs
I concur with the previous commenters and Jeanne about the meaning of theme. Aside from the themes of revenge, death, and madness, another theme I found in "Hamlet" is gender. Hamlet at one point states "frailty, thy name is woman"; Hamlet demonstrates a very eschewed view of the women in the play, Ophelia (commanding her to go to a nunnery) and his mother, Queen Gertrude (Hamlet loves her, but is obsessed about her private life with Claudius.)
Aymen Murdos
I agree with Brian about how the theme generally concerns death and how it will come to all of us regardless of our rank in society. This is very relevant during the final scene of Hamlet where the majority of the main characters end up dying, which is an element of a tragedy.
Lauren W.
I agree with Senia in that creating a theme statement is difficult because there are so many important aspects of the story and it is hard to combine them all in a way that makes sense. It is also difficult to remain general about it with out drawing in refrences from the book or singling out people. The theme from Hamlet could be about revenge, indecision, or gender (like quinn said).
Every play we have read so far has been tragedy and I will now list the plays, their tragic hero and his flaw.
Beowulf his tragic flaw is being a hero. Although that sounds paradox it is not. In the end of the story Beowulf knows that it is his heroic duty to go and slay the dragon even in his old age. This leads to both his downfall and the downfall of his country.
Grendel You could argue Grendel and his flaw would probably be instinct. Although he can't control it leads him to go and eat people out of the castle every night which leads to his death and his mother's death.
Canterbury tales and Dantes inferno were not however tragedies.
Hamlet tragic flaw is indecision. His indecision leads to the king living longer his mom's death Polonius death and his kingdoms downfall
Oedipus Tragic flaw was inability to see. This is both ironic and a tragic flaw. The blind person could see the future that Oedipus could not and at the end once Oedipus could see what had happened he went blind. That's ironic
Things fall apart Onkonkwo Tragic flaw is his determination to achieve. He attempts to try too hard to be the best. He kills the man because if the village changes he knows he will no longer be the best.
Adding machine Mr. Zero tragic flaw is his inability to change. He gets fired and kills his boss because he can't deal with the change which leads to his death.
I too did not know there was much more to tragedy than a sad story. While we have read other tragedies in other English classes the definition and concepts of it were never stated. It proves that literature is much more complicated than it can seem. This is also true with theme. I always thought a piece of literature had one theme and it could clearly be seen. As we have been exploring theme in Hamlet and other novels, I see that there are multiple themes to one book and because there are multiple ones they can be hard to define. One thing that shocked me was to find out theme couldn't be cliche. If anything I thought theme was usually a cliche statement. Another thing that surprised me was that theme couldn't be a general statement that applied to everything. I thought that was what theme was suppose to be. These statements really show how much other English classes have NOT been teaching us and how much we have been learning in this class by analyzing the literature instead of simply reading it.
Another common element of tragedies is comic relief, which although present in Hamlet, was not too evident in both Oedipus and Things Fall Apart. Are some elements more important than others? How many of these elements can be missing for a tragedy to still be tragic?
(Christian Cassman)
Jessica Sands
I agree wit Jeanne also, I really didnt know what a tragedy was. I had always thought that it was just a sad story. Little did i know that it really has a great deal of complexity to it. I think shakespeare also made a very good argument about the finality and equity of death. I think this may have been something the lower class people may have wanted to hear in the shakespearian age. It may have given them hope that they would be considered equals with kings after they die.
I think we can all agree that before this class we had not been exposed to much tragedy. Now we have been exposed to a great deal of it. We all know the things to look for to identify a tragedy. Tragic heros and tragic flaws have become a very comfortable place for us. Jeanne uses the example of Hamlet as a tragedy which fits perfectly. Hamlet is a powerful figure with a long way to fall. The ghost of Hamlet's father fulfills the supernatural element of tragedies. While Hamlet is definitely a tragic play, there are also funny moments throughout it. This comic relief is also frequently seen in tragic works to lighten the mood.
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