Macbeth Tragic Hero Essay

into model tragic heroes. The main characters in each of the plays experience a tragic fall from grace, as they both soon experience the backlash from their misguided decisions. In Oedipus, the King the main character, Oedipus, is the current king of the ancient Greek city of Thebes. Oedipus’ life of luxury unravels as throughout the play it is revealed…

Miller is a tragic play, which ends with a tragic ending of a protagonist dying and reflecting upon his own mistakes. It begins in the year of 1692 in Salem, Massachusetts, consisting of mainly Puritans. One of the main characters, John Proctor, has an affair with a girl named Abigail. This results in the start to her obsessive feeling towards Proctor, ultimately creating the witch trials in Salem to officially begin. According to Literary Devices, tragic hero is defined, ¨The term “hero” is…

The theme of power is explored in various ways throughout ‘Othello’, Shakespeare uses his characters’ flaws to denote power, often through the art of manipulation. The value consensus of the Elizabethan era also highlights the difference in gender roles, and the social expectations that were forced upon them, largely defined by the divine order. The power and influence of social mobility also creates a strong platform for the theme of power to be embedded upon, as characters such as Desdemona…

Death is often viewed as a tragic, terrible event, yet it it also often romanticized. Despite the horror that was World War I, emphasis is often placed on the heroic bravery of the soldiers. Likewise, the ancient Greeks glorified death, especially death in battle. Kleos, a word which roughly translates as “glory” or “reputation,” perfectly represents the Greek desire to be remembered as a hero. The Odyssey, written by Homer, critiques this desire by showing how the pursuit of kleos inevitably…

In Ancient Greek culture, revenge was a common theme. This is also reflected in Homer’s epic, The Odyssey. According to Odysseus’ account in The Odyssey, most of his struggles came from a curse that the Cyclops Polyphemus placed on him as revenge for blinding him. Additionally, the trojan war essentially started as a revenge by the Greek city states for Paris of Troy taking Helen, Menelaus’s wife. What do these myths tell us about revenge? The myths show that revenge is a powerful force that…

Garrettsville, Ohio was a poetic genius who was driven, and hampered, by his self-destructive personality. His alcoholism, sexual excesses and volatile behavior gave him the illusion of personal stability and lead to his greatest poems, but also brought his tragic doom. Cranes poems, though not always autobiographical, can be understood by looking at the occurrences in his turbulent life. Crane acted as his own worst enemy. The feeling, mood, style and form of Cranes poems mirrored his many mood…

Tragic events serve to provide wisdom and learning experiences. The tragedy of Othello by William Shakespeare exemplifies tragedy at its worst, and how such a state is reached. Othello is a man of nobility, who loves a woman named Desdemona. The tragic events of the play show how Othello is betrayed by a seemingly trustworthy advisor, Iago. Iago ruins the life of innocent Othello for personal gratification and fulfilment of his own desires. Iago is a self-centered man who disregards the lives of…

Odysseus was an utterly prideful man that wanted more than kudos, fame, and glory in his name. His sin of pride continued to consume him to the point he insulted the gods and goddesses that he didn’t need them to win or did he ever have any aid during the war from them. These foolish acts lead the gods to establish punishments to show Odysseus how to be modest and have humility. Three significant events that resulted in Odysseus becoming humble was plundering the Land of the Cicones, going up…

A hero can be defined as someone who possesses upstanding qualities or has accomplished impressive feats. Similarly, a tragic hero in a piece of literature possesses upstanding qualities, yet also has a tragic flaw that eventually leads to his demise. For these reasons, the character John Proctor in the play The Crucible by Arthur Miller is a tragic hero. Due to how John Proctor can be characterized as having goodness and a superior reputation, a tragic flaw, and an epiphany moment, he is the…

Sympathy is feeling pity for someone else’s misfortune, but it’s not possible to feel for a despicable person. For example, it is possible to sympathize for a tragic hero because they unintentionally agonize people, but it is not possible to feel compassion for someone who purposefully harms people. This can be seen in Achebe’s Things Fall Apart where Okonkwo is powerfull man in Umuofia, a village in Nigeria in the 19th century. He is a self made man who prides himself on his achievements and…