“The suffering and calamity are, moreover, exceptional. They befall a conspicuous person. They are themselves of some striking kind. They are also, as a rule, unexpected, and contrasted with previous happiness or glory. A tale, for example, of a man slowly worn to death by disease, poverty, little cares, sordid vices, petty persecutions, however piteous or dreadful it might be, would not be tragic in the Shakespearean sense.” MenKindLittlesPersonsMightCareSufferingPovertyExampleDiseaseGloryVicesTalesUnexpectedTragicWornPersecutionPettyExceptionalCalamity Book:Shakespearean Tragedy Source: Shakespearean Tragedy
“Such exceptional suffering and calamity, then, affecting the hero, and-we must now add-generally extending far and wide beyond him, so as to make the whole scene a scene of woe, are an essential ingredient in tragedy and a chief source of the tragic emotions, and especially of pity. But the proportions of this ingredient, and the direction taken by tragic pity, will naturally vary greatly.” WholeSufferingEmotionTakenSourceHeroSceneEssentialsTragedyAddWidePityChiefsProportionTragicIngredientsWoeExceptionalCalamityVaryExtending Author:A. C. Bradley