Greek tragedies originated from Dionysian sacrifices, and most of their themes were taken from myths.

There were three most famous tragic poets in ancient Greece: Aeschylus, Sophocles and euripides.

The theme of Greek tragedies often involves fate. "Poets often use fate to explain contradictions and difficulties that they cannot understand and solve."

1) Plato belittled "imitation of poetry" from the perspective of politicians.

He thinks they blaspheme, belittle heroes, corrode people's hearts and cultivate people's sentimentality and compassion. "Once this hobby is cultivated, it cannot be overcome with reason when encountering similar situations in real life, so he expelled the poet from utopia.

2) Aristotle was the first person to define tragedy.

Aristotle wrote in Poetics, "Tragedy is the imitation of a serious, complete and long action; His medium is language, and all kinds of pleasant sounds are used in all parts of the play. Imitation is expressed by the actions of characters, not by narration; This emotion is cultivated by causing pity and fear. "

A. He believes that every tragedy must contain six elements: plot, characters, thoughts, words, images and songs.

B. the plot is the most important, followed by personality.

In tragedy, the purpose of performance is not to portray the characters, but to show the actions and then the characters.

This is Aristotle's plot center theory.

C Aristotle believes that a good plot should have four characteristics: first, integrity; Second, it has a certain length: it is limited to one week of the sun.

On this basis, later French classicists put forward the "unity of time" in the "three unifications" and strictly followed it as a universal and eternal creative criterion.

Third, consistency (part and whole); Fourthly, universality: Aristotle believes that poetry focuses on generality, while history focuses on individuality.

D. A good plot should also include three components: mutation, discovery and suffering.

"sharp turn" refers to arranging some actions to make the protagonist suddenly turn from prosperity to adversity;

"Discovery" refers to the reason why the action reveals the potential secret of the hero from prosperity to adversity;

"Suffering" is an act of destruction or pain, such as death and injury.

E. The essence of tragic conflict is that good people make mistakes, which is the "negligence theory".

Conflict is the basis of the plot and the key to show the character.

The tragic figure should be the same as or taller than ordinary people. He turned from prosperity to adversity because of his own mistakes.

F. In terms of the effect of tragedy, Aristotle put forward the "purification theory", that is, tragedy makes people feel pity and fear, and removes depressed emotions.

Through the indulgence and catharsis of emotions, people's mood is finally restored to calm and their hearts are purified.

Two. ancient Rome

In ancient Rome, there were frequent wars, political chaos and the spirit of collectivism disappeared. Literature mainly reflects personal feelings and daily life.

Horace is the most accomplished literary theorist in this period.

His Poetic Art is an important literary theory work that appeared in ancient Europe after Aristotle's Poetics.

A. He advocates the principle of "appropriateness", that is, the narrative should conform to the theme, and all kinds of poems have their own uses and cannot be mixed; Language should conform to the identity of the characters; Personality should be suitable for age; The overall image should be unified.

B. "Education through fun".

This is the synthesis of Plato's enlightenment thought and Aristotle's purification thought.

Three. Renaissance:

/kloc-The Renaissance in the middle of the 0/4th century originated in Italy and then swept across Europe.

At this time, humanists advocate "humanity" and oppose "Shinto"; Advocate "human rights" and oppose "theocracy"; Advocate "individual liberation" and oppose "asceticism".

1) Italy: Violleau, castel.

A. His explanation of "three unifications" is the most systematic and comprehensive.

That is, "the venue must remain unchanged", "the performance time must be strictly consistent with the performance time", "the activity time should not exceed 12 hours" and "the protagonist's lucky transformation should be completed within a limited time and place".

This thought was not only very popular in the Renaissance, but also had a far-reaching impact on later classicism and even a longer period.

B. Aiming at Aristotle's "plot-centered theory", the "personality-centered theory" was put forward.

Expressing character through behavior is considered to be the key to the success of tragedy.

C regarding the function of tragedy, it is believed that the function of tragedy should be to entertain the public, that is, people without education.

2) Britain: Shakespeare.

His tragedy spread the humanistic thoughts of "freedom" and "fraternity", paid attention to characterization, and reflected the real life of Britain at that time.

Shakespeare's tragedy broke through the principle of "three unifications" and had a far-reaching impact on Europe and even the whole world.

4. Neoclassical period:

/kloc-at the beginning of the 0/7th century, neoclassicism first rose in France. The characteristics of tragedy theory in this period are:

First, we advocate rationality and rationality over emotion.

Gao Naiyi, the founder and representative writer of French classical tragedy, emphasized in his theory that the character of tragic heroes lies in the fact that civil obligations overwhelm personal feelings; Tragic plot can be fictional, but it must be possible; The only purpose of tragedy is to give the audience * * *, and enlightenment lies in * * *; The audience should be sober after enjoying the work, not crazy.

Second, advocating harmony and elegance in art.

Gao Naiyi believes that the theme of tragedy needs lofty, extraordinary and serious events.

He also believes that the protagonists of tragedy are not necessarily kings and princes.

Thirdly, tragedy creation strictly follows the "three unifications".

In the classical period, most tragedy theorists regarded the "three unifications" as eternal truths and strictly observed them.

Boileau wrote it into the art of poetry, making it more authoritative.

Johnson, the representative writer of the late English classicism, did not simply accept the "three unifications", but made a detailed analysis and ruthless criticism of the unification of time and place.

Modern literary theory

Verb (abbreviation for verb) During the Enlightenment:

The emerging bourgeoisie has established a rational philosophy, emphasizing individual rights and obligations.

The tragedy at this time focuses on the realistic description of bourgeois life.

Germany: Lessing is one of the theorists who deeply criticized classicism.

He opposed the "three unifications"; Those who advocate that tragedy describes natural persons, that is, the bourgeoisie and the citizen class at that time, put forward the requirement of creating citizen tragedies; He opposes exaggerated fiction and advocates that tragedy reflects truth and nature.

The theory of intransitive verbs in German classical literature

German classical literature theory is regarded as the most brilliant literary theory system, and a number of famous philosophical masters such as Kant, Hegel, Goethe and Schiller have emerged. Among them, Hegel's achievements in tragedy theory are the highest, and he is recognized as "the only philosopher who makes an original and in-depth discussion on tragedy" after Aristotle.

Hegel's tragic theory is mainly embodied in:

First, put forward the "conflict theory" of the nature of tragedy.

Hegel first applied dialectics to tragedy criticism, thinking that tragedy is a dialectical process of unity of opposites.

He believes that contradictions and conflicts are the basis of tragedy.

Hegel attaches importance to the conflict caused by spiritual differences, and thinks that the ideal tragedy is a tragedy based on the conflict caused by spiritual differences.

Under his influence, tragedy must show conflict, which has become the creative principle of many western tragedy writers.

Second, Hegel put forward the types of tragic conflicts: one is conflicts caused by objective conditions, such as conflicts caused by external factors such as natural reasons and class status; The other is the conflict of mind, which Hegel thinks is the most ideal conflict.

Third, the tragic ending is the victory of "eternal justice" or "eternal justice".

He believes that both sides of the tragic conflict are reasonable and one-sided, and there are two tragic endings: one is that both sides of the conflict perish together; Second, one side gave in automatically, giving up one-sidedness, and the two sides reconciled, so "eternal justice won."

Modern literary theory

Seven. intuitionism

At the end of the eighteenth century and the beginning of the nineteenth century, intellectuals were disappointed with the cruel reality and doubted the traditional rational values, so anti-rationalism (voluntarism) rose.

Schopenhauer and Nietzsche are representatives.

Schopenhauer (1) believes that tragedy is a special manifestation of human misfortune, and human suffering is innate and inevitable.

A. At the end of the tragedy, Schopenhauer put forward the theory of "tragic abandonment", arguing that the final outcome was that the tragic characters gave up their eager pursuit and all the pleasures of life forever after long-term struggle and pain.

B Schopenhauer divides tragedies into three types: first, the people in a play are themselves troublemakers of tragedies; Second, tragic misfortune is caused by blind fate or accidental mistakes; Thirdly, the tragic misfortune is caused by the different status and relationship of the characters in the play.

Schopenhauer's tragic view emphasizes the tragic fate of human beings.

Because the world in which human beings live is only pain and misfortune, in this environment, tragedies will happen at any time.

The misfortune of tragic characters is not due to their own defects, but to human limitations.

2) Nietzsche: The theory of tragedy is mainly concentrated in his book The Birth of Tragedy, in which the concepts of Apollo and Dionysus are introduced for the first time.

Apollo stands for plastic arts and Dionysus stands for music arts.

Apollo spirit makes people indulge in the beauty of things, immerse themselves in dreams, forget the pain of reality, and gain peace of mind.

Dionysian spirit is a kind of "terror" or "ecstasy" drunken state, in which people are on cloud nine and subjectively disappear into self-forgetting.

In short, "Nietzsche thought that Dionysus bewitched reality and dispelled individuals; Apollo dreamed of reality and created individuals ... Apollo and Dionysus were the motive force and source of tragic art. "Nietzsche believed that the reason for the decline of ancient Greek tragedy was that reason replaced Dionysus spirit.

"The core of Nietzsche's tragic theory is to advocate a tragic culture based on Dionysian spirit and oppose a rationalist culture."

Postmodern literary theory

Eight. Western Marxist literary theory;

/kloc-In the mid-9th century, Marx and Engels applied dialectical materialism and historical materialism to tragedy theory. On the basis of Hegel's tragic conflict theory, they further innovated and developed the contradiction between two different characters into two aspects of the internal contradiction of the same character, and put forward the theory that the internal contradiction of the characters is the root of tragedy.

In terms of characters, Marx and Engels put forward that the ideal tragic character should be a contradictory and complicated character.

People with this personality suffer from two kinds of inner feelings, which cause great pain.

Inner contradictions lead tragic characters to tragic endings.

His tragedy theory fundamentally belongs to the theory of character tragedy, that is, the root of tragedy comes from the character defect of the protagonist.

At the same time, it also points out the external conditions that constitute tragic characters, which makes the destruction of tragic characters closely related to social development.

In the 20th century, drama (stage play) gradually withdrew from the dominant position.

The theme of modern western tragedy is mainly the survival dilemma and value of human beings in capitalist society.

Modern western society is a tragic era, but the tragic theory at this time is almost zero.

It is a tragic irony that when human beings are increasingly facing the crisis of survival and belief, when the whole human being is in a tragic situation and urgently needs tragedy to express itself, the great tragedy theory and tragedy creation are missing.