Poetics | Page 7

without Recognition.
A Complex action is one in which the change is accompanied by such
Reversal, or by Recognition, or by both. These last should arise from
the internal structure of the plot, so that what follows should be the
necessary or probable result of the preceding action. It makes all the
difference whether any given event is a case of propter hoc or post hoc.

XI
Reversal of the Situation is a change by which the action veers round to
its opposite, subject always to our rule of probability or necessity. Thus
in the Oedipus, the messenger comes to cheer Oedipus and free him
from his alarms about his mother, but by revealing who he is, he
produces the opposite effect. Again in the Lynceus, Lynceus is being
led away to his death, and Danaus goes with him, meaning, to slay him;
but the outcome of the preceding incidents is that Danaus is killed and
Lynceus saved. Recognition, as the name indicates, is a change from
ignorance to knowledge, producing love or hate between the persons
destined by the poet for good or bad fortune. The best form of
recognition is coincident with a Reversal of the Situation, as in the
Oedipus. There are indeed other forms. Even inanimate things of the
most trivial kind may in a sense be objects of recognition. Again, we
may recognise or discover whether a person has done a thing or not.
But the recognition which is most intimately connected with the plot
and action is, as we have said, the recognition of persons. This
recognition, combined, with Reversal, will produce either pity or fear;

and actions producing these effects are those which, by our definition,
Tragedy represents. Moreover, it is upon such situations that the issues
of good or bad fortune will depend. Recognition, then, being between
persons, it may happen that one person only is recognised by the
other-when the latter is already known--or it may be necessary that the
recognition should be on both sides. Thus Iphigenia is revealed to
Orestes by the sending of the letter; but another act of recognition is
required to make Orestes known to Iphigenia.
Two parts, then, of the Plot--Reversal of the Situation and
Recognition-- turn upon surprises. A third part is the Scene of Suffering.
The Scene of Suffering is a destructive or painful action, such as death
on the stage, bodily agony, wounds and the like.

XII
[The parts of Tragedy which must be treated as elements of the whole
have been already mentioned. We now come to the quantitative parts,
and the separate parts into which Tragedy is divided, namely, Prologue,
Episode, Exode, Choric song; this last being divided into Parode and
Stasimon. These are common to all plays: peculiar to some are the
songs of actors from the stage and the Commoi.
The Prologue is that entire part of a tragedy which precedes the Parode
of the Chorus. The Episode is that entire part of a tragedy which is
between complete choric songs. The Exode is that entire part of a
tragedy which has no choric song after it. Of the Choric part the Parode
is the first undivided utterance of the Chorus: the Stasimon is a Choric
ode without anapaests or trochaic tetrameters: the Commos is a joint
lamentation of Chorus and actors. The parts of Tragedy which must be
treated as elements of the whole have been already mentioned. The
quantitative parts the separate parts into which it is divided--are here
enumerated.]

XIII

As the sequel to what has already been said, we must proceed to
consider what the poet should aim at, and what he should avoid, in
constructing his plots; and by what means the specific effect of Tragedy
will be produced.
A perfect tragedy should, as we have seen, be arranged not on the
simple but on the complex plan. It should, moreover, imitate actions
which excite pity and fear, this being the distinctive mark of tragic
imitation. It follows plainly, in the first place, that the change, of
fortune presented must not be the spectacle of a virtuous man brought
from prosperity to adversity: for this moves neither pity nor fear; it
merely shocks us. Nor, again, that of a bad man passing from adversity
to prosperity: for nothing can be more alien to the spirit of Tragedy; it
possesses no single tragic quality; it neither satisfies the moral sense
nor calls forth pity or fear. Nor, again, should the downfall of the utter
villain be exhibited. A plot of this kind would, doubtless, satisfy the
moral sense, but it would inspire neither pity nor fear; for pity is
aroused by unmerited misfortune, fear by the misfortune of a man like
ourselves. Such an event, therefore, will be neither pitiful nor terrible.
There