Pity and Fear/Tragic Pleasure
According to Aristotle, tragedy does not end in total gloom. And the aim of tragedy is to give pleasure the feeling of pity and fear. A tragedy like another kind of poetry imitates action and life, its pain and misery. Therefore, Aristotle considers pleasure as an essential and moral function of poetry. In other words, Aristotle recognizes the value of emotional effects of poetry and says that there is a total emotional identification of the spectator with the persons who suffer on the stage. And with this view in mind, Aristotle recommends Peripetia and Anagnorisis- reversal and recognition to heighten the tragic action. According to Aristotle, fear and pity may be excited by means of spectacle but they may also arise from the structure of the action for the ordering of incidents in the plot is such that even without seeing it performed on the stage, one shudders with fear and pity, as a result of what is happening. For example, the hearing of the story of Oedipus would fill one with pity and fear. Aristotle also points out that tragedy brings us a sense of relief through catharsis, the purgation of emotion. The source of tragic pleasure is partly derived from verse and rhyme because they enhance the pleasure of poetry, although verse and rhyme may not be necessary. A successful tragedy gives us pleasure because it is an imitation of men in action and provides a kind of inner illumination. Aristotle observes that near relations have been treated in the plot of all great tragedies only to produce the tragic pleasure of pity and fear, which is the true end of the tragedy. In fact, the unity of plot; diction, spectacle etc. are the sources of pleasure in a tragedy.