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Jarrett examines the question of what “tragedy” is, beginning with Plato’s cryptic remarks in the Symposium about the shared genius of comedy and tragedy. He then turns to Aristotle’s definition, weighing critical disputes about requirements such as seriousness, magnitude, and the paired effects of pity and fear (or terror). He further challenges definitional authority through a semanticist lens, including Humpty-Dumpty and formal logic, asking how one can judge a definition of tragedy.",{"@graph":69,"@context":122},[70,84,105],{"@type":71,"itemListElement":72},"BreadcrumbList",[73,77,79,82],{"item":74,"name":75,"@type":76,"position":8},"https://docshare.wps.com","Home","ListItem",{"item":78,"name":9,"@type":76,"position":14},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/",{"item":80,"name":15,"@type":76,"position":81},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/literature/",3,{"item":83,"name":65,"@type":76,"position":19},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/tragedy-a-study-in-explication/323683/",{"url":83,"name":65,"@type":85,"image":86,"author":91,"headline":65,"publisher":94,"fileFormat":97,"inLanguage":63,"description":67,"dateModified":98,"datePublished":99,"encodingFormat":97,"isAccessibleForFree":100,"interactionStatistic":101},"DigitalDocument",{"url":87,"@type":88,"width":89,"height":90},"https://docshare.wps.com/thumbnails/tragedy-a-study-in-explication/323683.png","ImageObject",300,407,{"name":92,"@type":93},"Clementine","Person",{"url":74,"name":95,"@type":96},"DocShare","Organization","application/pdf","2026-10-21","2026-09-21",true,{"@type":102,"interactionType":103,"userInteractionCount":24},"InteractionCounter",{"@type":104},"ViewAction",{"@type":106,"mainEntity":107},"FAQPage",[108,114,118],{"name":109,"@type":110,"acceptedAnswer":111},"What does Plato’s Symposium suggest about tragedy and comedy?","Question",{"text":112,"@type":113},"Socrates is said to compel others to assent that the genius of comedy is the same as that of tragedy, and that the true artist in tragedy is also an artist in comedy.","Answer",{"name":115,"@type":110,"acceptedAnswer":116},"How does Aristotle define tragedy, and what emotions does it involve?",{"text":117,"@type":113},"Aristotle presents tragedy as an imitation of a serious action of a certain magnitude, accomplishing the proper purgation of pity and fear (or terror) through pity and fear.",{"name":119,"@type":110,"acceptedAnswer":120},"Why does the article question the reliability of definitions of “tragedy”?",{"text":121,"@type":113},"It contrasts Humpty-Dumpty’s view that meaning depends on what a speaker declares with the logical idea that definitions concern symbols, then pressures the reader to ask how any definition can be evaluated as right or wrong.","https://schema.org",{"og:url":83,"og:type":124,"og:title":65,"og:site_name":95,"og:description":67},"article",{"robots":126,"canonical":83},"index,follow",{"doc_id":128,"site_id":62},323683,1790142670,{"code":4,"msg":5,"data":131},{"doc_id":128,"user_id":132,"nickname":92,"user_avatar":133,"doc_module":4,"category_id":14,"category_name":15,"doc_title":65,"doc_description":67,"doc_content":134,"file_id":135,"file_url":136,"file_type":137,"file_size":138,"view_count":24,"is_deleted":4,"is_public":8,"is_downloadable":8,"audit_status":8,"page_count":39,"language":139,"language_code":63,"site_id":62,"html_lang":63,"table_of_contents":140,"faqs":141,"seo_title":142,"seo_description":67,"update_tm":143,"read_time":144},1374391974564,"https://ap-avatar.wpscdn.com/avatar/14000253aa45c000a9e?x-image-process=image/resize,m_fixed,w_180,h_180&k=1779874745381141002","40ce  \n# “Tragedy“:A study in explication\n\nJames L.Jarrett suggests an approach to the question,What “is”tragedy?  \nThere is in Plato's Symposium one ofthose teasingly cryptic,offhand re-marks that constitute not the leastsource of his—and many another au-thor's—fascination for us.The dis-courses on love were at an end,Alci-biades had been silenced at last,thepace of the debauchery had slowed toa creep:  \n\"There remained only Socrates,Aristophanes,and Agathon,who weredrinking out of a large goblet whichthey passed round,and Socrates wasdiscoursing to them.Aristodemus wasonly half awake,and he did not hearthe beginning of the discourse;the chiefthing which he remembered was Socra-tes compelling the other two to ac-knowledge that the genius of comedywas the same with that of tragedy,andthat the true artist in tragedy was anartist in comedy also.To this they wereconstrained to assent,being drowsy,and not quite following the argument.\"1  \nJust this much and no more.Alas!What did Socrates mean?What was hearguing?A fruitless question.Indeed,as Plato complained,that is the greatfault of books:they do not answer yourquestions,but only go on forever re-peating like a parrot their little sayingsAnd it is no good looking elsewhere inPlato,for the answer is not to be found.  \nIt can be found,of course,in Aris-totle;or,more properly,reasons canthere be found for maintaining againstSocrates that the genius of comedy isnot the same with that of tragedy.About comedy there is a certain low-ness,but tragedy is essentially noble.\"Tragedy is an imitation of an actionthat is serious,complete,and of a cer-tain magnitude...through pity andfear effecting the proper purgation ofthese emotions.\"2  \nAristotle wrote no words more pro-  \n1Jowett translation,p.233.2S.H.Butcher translation,p.1449b.  \nReprinted from Etc.A Review of Gen-eral Semantics,Spring,1955,issue.  \nvocative than these.If one should callthe roll of the literary critics who havepraised and abused,explicated,amend-ed,abridged,and adopted this defini-tion,the list would omit the names ofbut few who count.Among the hetero-dox there have been numerous attemptsto shorten the list of the genuine essen-tials of a tragedy.Some would extendthe genre to include prose narrative;some would excise “purgation”;othersthink that length is a matter of indiffer-ence.Perhaps of all parts the listing ofthe pair of emotions,pity and fear(orterror),has gained widest accord—though even here there is by no meansunanimity.In Webster's we find for thevery first definition:\"A literary com-position,esp.a narrative,which excitespity or terror by a succession of sorrow-ful events,miseries,or misfortunes,leading to a catastrophe.\"To a strictAristotelian the admission of narrativeis heresy:the“esp.”almost insultingeven though in medieval times \"trag-edy\"typically referred to epic and nar-rative work,and today the word may  \nEmma Borman:Theatre  \nwell have the usage the dictionary con-tends for.But more important is the dis-junction,“pity or terror”;probably theweight of critical opinion today wouldscout the \"or\"on the ground that other-wise pathos would become indistin-guishable from tragedy.  \nOf those who have held with Aris-totlo Iosenh Xood Krutch hatotle,Joseph Wood Krutch hasmade the most startling use of the fa-mous definition.3 Whereas the tendencyhas been,in the history of literary criti-cism,always to soften the rigid specifi-cations of the Aristotelian list of re-quirements for a true tragedy in orderto make room for a new work,not quiteconforming to the Aeschylean model,but withal certainly\"tragic\";Krutchsays,in effect,Aristotle is right and thefact that recent literary works do notmeet his specifications means simplythat there are no tragedies in our time.Not just that there do not happen to beany—there cannot be any:the spirit ofour era does not allow such—amongst3In The Modern Temper.  \nMerschel Collection  \nus the idea of nobility has no place;wehave no capacity for religion and soon....  \nI break off b","cbCaic6U87OvI9Tx","https://ap.wps.com/l/cbCaic6U87OvI9Tx","pdf",714263,"English","# “Tragedy“: A study in explication\n## Plato’s Symposium and the comedy-tragedy link\n## Aristotle’s definition: pity and fear\n## Critical revisions of Aristotelian requirements\n## Definitional disputes and how to test meaning","[{\"question\":\"What does Plato’s Symposium suggest about tragedy and comedy?\",\"answer\":\"Socrates is said to compel others to assent that the genius of comedy is the same as that of tragedy, and that the true artist in tragedy is also an artist in comedy.\"},{\"question\":\"How does Aristotle define tragedy, and what emotions does it involve?\",\"answer\":\"Aristotle presents tragedy as an imitation of a serious action of a certain magnitude, accomplishing the proper purgation of pity and fear (or terror) through pity and fear.\"},{\"question\":\"Why does the article question the reliability of definitions of “tragedy”?\",\"answer\":\"It contrasts Humpty-Dumpty’s view that meaning depends on what a speaker declares with the logical idea that definitions concern symbols, then pressures the reader to ask how any definition can be evaluated as right or wrong.\"}]","“Tragedy“: A study in explication | PDF",1789965875,12]