Paper #1: Defining Tragedy--due Wed, September 7th

Spiegelman's graphic novel, Maus, one of the great modern 'tragedies' 

Paper #1: Defining Tragedy

For your first paper, I want you to take ONE of the provocative statements made by Poole in his Tragedy: A Very Short Introduction and use a modern work of art (a book, film, TV series, album, painting, etc.) to explain and examine it. In other words, I want you to discuss what you think the quote means (and feel free to use other parts of Poole’s book to explain it), and then apply it to a modern work which can help you illustrate your definition. Try to avoid being VAGUE: don’t just say “The Godfather does a lot of things in this quote, and makes me really understand it better.” Discuss a specific passage or two to help us see (a) what the quote is really getting at, and (b) how it helps us read and appreciate a modern work of tragedy.

THE QUOTES:

• “But there is a more political aspect to the living dead…they embody values, ideas, and ethics that challenge the present and obstruct the future. The living dead are by nature conservative, if not reactionary…they insist that the world remain as it was for them” (Chapter 3).
• “One of the distinctive features of modern tragedy is that it takes such an interest in private, even secret, mourning…This is a paradox embodied in many modern texts and works of art that seek to share griefs, bereavements, and traumas that would otherwise remain private, neglected, unnoticed” (Chapter 3).
• “Of course tragic characters are primitive, barbaric, monstrous. They represent all that we have had to overcome in the cause of culture and civilization…tragedy shows us what we are missing” (Chapter 4).
• “Tragedy represents the conflict not of right against wrong—which is melodrama or simply justice—but of right against right” (Chapter 5).
• “This is why we should attend closely to the way within tragedies that people witness each other’s pain. To us, the readers, spectators, and viewers, they are third persons, as we are to them, separated by the frame of fiction. Tragedies abound with bystanders, advisors, and counsellors” (Chapter 5).

NOTE: You can use a fuller quote than the one listed above, though it has to use some part of these quotes (don’t choose an unrelated quote, since I want you to grapple wit h these ‘big’ ones).

REQUIREMENTS: At least 2-3 pages double spaced, though you can do more. You MUST quote from Poole and try to quote or discuss specific passages/ideas from your work of art. Assume I’ve never seen it, so bring me through it with enough context to understand why it illustrates the quote and is relevant.

DUE IN-CLASS WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 7^th (after Labor Day): I plan to discuss some of our approaches in class, so bring your paper with you!