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Comic and tragic in works of world art. Abstract: The tragic, its manifestation in art and in life. Need help studying a topic?

01.07.2020

Introduction………………………………………………………………………………..3

1. Tragedy – irreparable loss and affirmation of immortality………………..4

2. General philosophical aspects of the tragic……………….………………………...5

3. Tragic in art……………………………………………………….7

4. Tragic in life……………………………………………………………..12

Conclusion………………………………………………………………………………….16

References…………………………………………………………………………………18

INTRODUCTION

By aesthetically evaluating phenomena, a person determines the extent of his dominance over the world. This measure depends on the level and nature of development of society and its production. The latter reveals one or another meaning for a person of the natural properties of objects, determines their aesthetic properties. This explains that the aesthetic manifests itself in different forms: beautiful, ugly, sublime, base, tragic, comic, etc.

The expansion of human social practice entails an expansion of the range of aesthetic properties and aesthetically assessed phenomena.

There is no era in the history of mankind that would not be saturated with tragic events. Man is mortal, and every person living a conscious life cannot help but comprehend his attitude to death and immortality in one way or another. Finally, great art in his philosophical reflections on the world, he always internally gravitates towards a tragic theme. The tragic theme runs through the entire history of world art as one of the general themes. Others words and history society, the history of art, and the life of the individual in one way or another come into contact with the problem of the tragic. All this determines its importance for aesthetics.

1. TRAGEDY – IRREPAIRABLE LOSS AND AFFIRMATION OF IMMORTALITY

The 20th century is the century of the greatest social upheavals, crises, and turbulent changes that create the most complex and tense situations in one place or another on the globe. Therefore, theoretical analysis of the problem of the tragic for us is introspection and comprehension of the world in which we live.

In art different nations tragic death turns into resurrection, and sorrow turns into joy. For example, ancient Indian aesthetics expressed this pattern through the concept of “samsara,” which means the cycle of life and death, the reincarnation of a deceased person into another living being depending on the nature of the life he lived. The reincarnation of souls among the ancient Indians was associated with the idea of aesthetic improvement, ascent to something more beautiful. The Vedas, the oldest monument of Indian literature, affirmed the beauty of the afterlife and the joy of going into it.

Since ancient times, human consciousness could not come to terms with non-existence. As soon as people began to think about death, they affirmed immortality, and in oblivion people assigned a place to evil and accompanied him there with laughter.

Paradoxically, it is not tragedy that speaks about death, but satire. Satire proves the mortality of living and even triumphant evil. And tragedy affirms immortality, reveals the good and beautiful principles in a person, which triumph and win, despite the death of the hero.

Tragedy is a mournful song about an irreparable loss, a joyful hymn to the immortality of man. It is this deep nature of the tragic that manifests itself when the feeling of grief is resolved by joy (“I am happy”), death by immortality.

2. GENERAL PHILOSOPHICAL ASPECTS OF THE TRAGIC

A person leaves life irrevocably. Death is the transformation of living things into non-living things. However, the dead remains alive: culture stores everything that has passed, it is the extragenetic memory of humanity. G. Heine said that under every tombstone is the history of an entire world that cannot leave without a trace.

Understanding the death of a unique individuality as an irreparable collapse of the whole world, tragedy at the same time affirms the strength and infinity of the universe, despite the departure of a finite being from it. And in this very finite being, tragedy finds immortal traits that unite the personality with the universe, the finite with the infinite. Tragedy- philosophical art, posing and solving the highest metaphysical problems of life and death, realizing the meaning of being, analyzing the global problems of its stability, eternity, infinity, despite constant variability.

In tragedy, as Hegel believed, death is not only annihilation. It also means preserving in a transformed form that which must perish in this form. Hegel contrasts a creature suppressed by the instinct of self-preservation with the idea of liberation from “slave consciousness”, the ability to sacrifice one’s life for the sake of higher goals. For Hegel, the ability to comprehend the idea of endless development is the most important characteristic of human consciousness.

K. Marks already in early works criticizes Plutarch's idea of individual immortality, putting forward in contrast to it the idea of social immortality of man. For Marx, people who are afraid that after their death the fruits of their deeds will go not to them, but to humanity, are untenable. The products of human activity are the best continuation human life, while hopes for individual immortality are illusory.

Understanding tragic situations in the world artistic culture Two extreme positions emerged: existentialist and Buddhist.

Existentialism turned death into central problem philosophy and art. German philosopher K. Jaspers emphasizes that knowledge about man is tragic knowledge. In the book “On the Tragic,” he notes that the tragic begins where a person takes all his capabilities to the extreme, knowing that he will die. It's like self-fulfillment of personality at the cost own life. “Therefore, in tragic knowledge it is essential what a person suffers from and because of what he dies, what he takes upon himself, in the face of what reality and in what form he betrays his existence.” Jaspers proceeds from the fact that the tragic hero carries within himself both his happiness and his death.

A tragic hero is a bearer of something beyond the scope of individual existence, a bearer of power, principle, character, demon. Tragedy shows man in his greatness, free from good and evil, writes Jaspers, substantiating this position with a reference to Plato’s idea that neither good nor evil flows from a petty character, but a great nature is capable of both great evil and great good.

Tragedy exists where forces collide, each of which considers itself to be true. On this basis, Jaspers believes that the truth is not united, that it is split, and tragedy reveals this.

Thus, existentialists absolutize the self-worth of the individual and emphasize its alienation from society, which leads their concept to a paradox: the disastrous personality ceases to exist social problem. A person left alone with the universe, not feeling humanity around him, is overwhelmed by the terribly inevitable finitude of existence. She is alienated from people and in fact turns out to be absurd, and her life is devoid of meaning and value.

For Buddhism, when a person dies, he turns into another creature; he equates death with life (a person, while dying, continues to live, so death does not change anything). In both cases, all tragedy is actually removed.

The disastrous personality acquires a tragic sound only where a person, possessing self-worth, lives in the name of people, their interests become the content of his life. In this case, on the one hand, there is a unique individual identity and value of the individual, and on the other hand, the dying hero finds continuation in the life of society. Therefore, the death of such a hero is tragic and gives rise to a feeling of irretrievable loss of human individuality (and hence grief), and at the same time the idea of continuing the life of the individual in humanity arises (hence the motive of joy).

The source of the tragic is specific social contradictions - collisions between a socially necessary, urgent requirement and the temporary practical impossibility of its implementation. The inevitable lack of knowledge and ignorance often become the source of the greatest tragedies. The tragic is the sphere of understanding world-historical contradictions, the search for a way out for humanity. This category reflects not just a person’s misfortune caused by private problems, but the misfortunes of humanity, certain fundamental imperfections of existence that affect the fate of the individual.

3. TRAGIC IN ART

Each era brings its own features to the tragic and emphasizes certain aspects of its nature.

For example, Greek tragedy an open course of action is inherent. The Greeks managed to keep their tragedies entertaining, although both the characters and the audience were often informed about the will of the gods or the chorus predicted the further course of events. The audience knew well the plots of ancient myths, on the basis of which tragedies were mostly created. The fascination of Greek tragedy was firmly based on the taxation of action. The meaning of the tragedy lay in the character of the hero's behavior. Deaths of misfortune tragic hero are obviously known. And this is the naivety, freshness and beauty of ancient Greek art. This course of action played a big role artistic role, enhancing the tragic emotion of the viewer.

Hero ancient tragedy unable to prevent the inevitable, but he fights, acts, and only through his freedom, through his actions, is what must happen realized. This is, for example, Oedipus in Sophocles’ tragedy “Oedipus the King.” Of his own free will, consciously and freely, he searches for the causes of the misfortunes that befell the inhabitants of Thebes. And when it turns out that the “investigation” threatens to turn against the main “investigator” and that the culprit of Thebes’ misfortune is Oedipus himself, who by the will of fate killed his father and married his mother, he does not stop the “investigation”, but brings it to the end. Such is Antigone, the heroine of another tragedy by Sophocles. Unlike her sister Ismene, Antigone does not obey the order of Creon, who, on pain of death, forbids the burial of her brother, who fought against Thebes. The law of tribal relations, expressed in the need to bury the body of a brother, no matter what the cost, applies equally to both sisters, but Antigone becomes a tragic hero because she fulfills this necessity in her free actions.

Greek tragedy is heroic.

Ancient tragedy is catharsis. The feelings depicted in the tragedy purify the feelings of the viewer.

In the Middle Ages, the tragic appears not as heroic, but as martyrdom. Its goal is consolation. In the medieval theater, the passive principle was emphasized in the actor’s interpretation of the image of Christ. Sometimes the actor got used to the image of the crucified man so much that he himself found himself close to death.

The concept of catharsis is alien to medieval tragedy . This is not a tragedy of purification, but a tragedy of consolation. It is characterized by logic: you feel bad, but they (the heroes, or rather, the martyrs of the tragedy) are better than you, and they are worse off than you, so take comfort in your suffering in the fact that there are worse sufferings, and more severe torments for people, even less than you, who deserve it. Earthly consolation (you are not the only one who suffers) is enhanced by otherworldly consolation (there you will not suffer, and you will be rewarded according to your deserts).

If in ancient tragedy the most unusual things happen quite naturally, then in medieval tragedy the supernatural nature of what is happening occupies an important place.

At the turn of the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, the majestic figure of Dante rises. UDante has no doubt about the need for the eternal torment of Francesca and Paolo, who with their love violated the moral foundations of their age and the monolith of the existing world order, shaking and transgressing the prohibitions of earth and heaven. And at the same time, the Divine Comedy lacks supernaturalism and magic. For Dante and his readers, the geography of hell is absolutely real and the hellish whirlwind that carries the lovers is real. Here is the same naturalness of the supernatural, the reality of the unreal, which was inherent in ancient tragedy. And it is precisely this return of canticism on a new basis that makes Dante one of the first exponents of the ideas of the Renaissance.

The medieval man explained the world by God. The man of modern times sought to show that peace is the cause of oneself. In philosophy, this was expressed in Spinoza's classic thesis about nature as its own cause. In art, this principle was embodied and expressed by Shakespeare half a century ago. For him the whole world, including the sphere human passions and tragedies, does not need any otherworldly explanation; at its core is himself.

Romeo and Juliet carry the circumstances of their lives within them. From the characters themselves action is born. The fatal words: “His name is Romeo: he is the son of Montague, the son of your enemy” - did not change Juliet’s attitude towards her lover. The only measure and driving force her actions are herself, her character, her love for Romeo.

The Renaissance in its own way solved the problems of love and honor, life and death, personality and society, revealing for the first time the social nature of the tragic conflict. The tragedy during this period revealed the state of the world, confirmed human activity and freedom of will. At the same time, the tragedy of an unregulated personality arose. The only regulation for a person was the first and last commandment of the Thelema monastery: “Do what you want” (Rabelais. “Gargartua and Pantagruel”). However, freed from medieval religious morality, the individual sometimes lost all morality, conscience, and honor. Shakespeare's heroes (Othello, Hamlet) are uninhibited and not limited in their actions. And the actions of the forces of evil are just as free and unregulated (Iago, Claudius).

The hopes of humanists that the individual, having gotten rid of medieval restrictions, would use his freedom wisely and in the name of good, turned out to be illusory. The utopia of the unregulated personality in fact turned into its absolute regulation. France XVII V. This regulation manifested itself: in the sphere of politics - in the absolutist state, in the sphere of science and philosophy - in Descartes' teaching about the method that introduces human thought into the mainstream of strict rules, in the sphere of art - in classicism. The tragedy of utopian absolute freedom is being replaced by the tragedy of real absolute normative conditioning of the individual.

In the art of romanticism (G. Heine, F. Schiller, J. Byron, F. Chopin), the state of the world is expressed through the state of the spirit. Disappointment in the results of the Great French Revolution and the resulting disbelief in social progress give rise to the world grief characteristic of romanticism. Romanticism realizes that the universal principle may not have a divine, but a devilish nature and is capable of bringing evil. In the tragedies of Byron (“Cain”), the inevitability of evil and the eternity of the struggle against it are affirmed. The embodiment of such universal evil is Lucifer. Cain cannot accept any restrictions on freedom and power human spirit. But it is evil, and the hero cannot eliminate him from life even at the cost of his own death. However, for the romantic consciousness, the struggle is not meaningless: the tragic hero, through his struggle, creates oases of life in the desert, where evil reigns.

The art of critical realism revealed the tragic discord between the individual and society. One of the greatest tragic works of the 19th century. - “Boris Godunov” by A. S. Pushkin. Godunov wants to use power for the benefit of the people. But on his way to power, he commits evil - he kills the innocent Tsarevich Dimitri. And between Boris and the people there was an abyss of alienation, and then anger. Pushkin shows that you cannot fight for the people without the people. Human destiny is the people's destiny; For the first time, the actions of individuals are compared with the good of the people. Such problems are the product of a new era.

This same feature is inherent in the operatic and musical tragic images of M. P. Mussorgsky. His operas “Boris Godunov” and “Khovanshchina” brilliantly embody Pushkin’s formula of tragedy about the unity of human and people's destinies. For the first time, a people appeared on the opera stage, animated by a single idea of the struggle against slavery, violence, and tyranny. An in-depth characterization of the people highlighted the tragedy of the conscience of Tsar Boris. For all his good intentions, Boris remains alien to the people and secretly fears the people, who see it in him as the cause of their misfortunes. Mussorgsky deeply developed specific musical means conveying the tragic content of life: musical and dramatic contrasts, bright thematicism, mournful intonations, gloomy tonality and dark timbres of orchestration.

The development of the theme of rock in Beethoven's Fifth Symphony was of great importance for the development of the philosophical principle in tragic musical works. This topic received further development in Tchaikovsky's Fourth, Sixth and especially Fifth Symphonies. The tragic in Tchaikovsky's symphonies expresses the contradiction between human aspirations and life's obstacles, between the infinity of creative impulses and the finitude of the individual's existence.

IN critical realism XIX century (Dickens, Balzac, Stendhal, Gogol, Tolstoy, Dostoevsky and others) a non-tragic character becomes the hero of tragic situations. In life, the tragedy has become an “ordinary story”, and its hero has become an alienated person. And therefore, in art, tragedy as a genre disappears, but as an element it penetrates into all types and genres of art, capturing the intolerance of the discord between man and society.

In order for tragedy to cease to be a constant companion of social life, society must become humane, come into harmonious harmony with the individual. The desire of a person to overcome discord with the world, the search for the lost meaning of life - this is the concept of the tragic and the pathos of the development of this topic in critical realism of the 20th century. (E. Hemingway, W. Faulkner, L. Frank, G. Böll, F. Fellini, M. Antonioni, J. Gershwin and others).

Tragic art reveals the social meaning of human life and shows that the immortality of man is realized in the immortality of the people. An important theme of the tragedy is “man and history.” The world-historical context of a person’s actions turns him into a conscious or involuntary participant in the historical process. This makes the hero responsible for choosing the path, for correctly solving life issues and understanding its meaning. The character of the tragic hero is verified by the very course of history, its laws. The theme of the individual’s responsibility to history is deeply explored in “Quiet Don” by M. A. Sholokhov. The character of his hero is contradictory: he either shrinks, then deepens with internal torment, or is tempered by severe trials. His fate is tragic.

In music, a new type of tragic symphonism was developed by D. D. Shostakovich. If in the symphonies of P. I. Tchaikovsky, rock always invades the life of the individual from the outside as a powerful, inhuman, hostile force, then in Shostakovich such a confrontation arises only once - when the composer reveals a catastrophic invasion of evil, interrupting the calm flow of life (the theme of the invasion in the first part of the Seventh Symphony).

4. TRAGIC IN LIFE

Manifestations of the tragic in life are diverse: from the death of a child or the death of a person full of creative energy - to the defeat of the national liberation movement; from the tragedy of an individual to the tragedy of an entire nation. The tragic can also be contained in the struggle of man against the forces of nature. But the main source of this category is the struggle between good and evil, death and immortality, where death affirms life values, reveals the meaning of human existence, where philosophical understanding of the world takes place.

First World War, for example, went down in history as one of the bloodiest and most brutal wars. Never (before 1914) had the warring parties fielded such huge armies for mutual destruction. All the achievements of science and technology were aimed at exterminating people. During the war years, 10 million people were killed and 20 million people were wounded. In addition, significant human losses were suffered by the civilian population, who died not only as a result of combat operations, but also from hunger and disease that raged during the hard times of war. The war also entailed colossal material losses, gave rise to a mass revolutionary and democratic movement, whose participants demanded a radical renewal of life.

Then, in January 1933, the fascist National Socialist Workers' Party, the party of revenge and war, came to power in Germany. By the summer of 1941. Germany and Italy occupied 12 European countries and extended their dominance over a large part of Europe. In the occupied countries they established a fascist occupation regime, which they called the “new order”: they eliminated democratic freedoms, dissolved political parties and trade unions, banned strikes and demonstrations. The industry worked according to the orders of the occupiers, Agriculture supplied them with raw materials and food, labor was used in the construction of military facilities. All this led to the Second World War, as a result of which fascism was completely defeated. But unlike the First World War, in the Second World War most of the casualties were among the civilian population. In the USSR alone, the death toll amounted to at least 27 million people. In Germany, 12 million people were killed in concentration camps. Human. The victims of war and repression in Western European countries were 5 million. Human. To these 60 million lives lost in Europe must be added the many millions of people who died in the Pacific and other theaters of the Second World War.

Before the people had time to recover from one world tragedy, on August 6, 1945, an American plane dropped an atomic bomb on the Japanese city of Hiroshima. The atomic explosion caused terrible disasters: 90% of the buildings burned down, the rest turned into ruins. Of the 306 thousand inhabitants of Hiroshima, more than 90 thousand people immediately died. Tens of thousands of people died later from wounds, burns and radiation exposure. With the explosion of the first atomic bomb humanity has received at its disposal an inexhaustible source of energy and at the same time a terrible weapon capable of destroying all living things.

No sooner had humanity entered the 20th century than new wave tragic events swept the entire planet. This includes the intensification of terrorist attacks, natural disasters, and environmental problems. Economic activity in a number of countries today it is developed so powerfully that it affects the environmental situation not only within a particular country, but also far beyond its borders.

Typical examples:

The UK exports 2/3 of its industrial emissions.

75-90% of acid rain in Scandinavian countries is of foreign origin.

Acid rain in the UK affects 2/3 of forest areas, and in the countries of continental Europe - about half of their areas.

The United States lacks the oxygen that is naturally produced on its territory.

The largest rivers, lakes, and seas of Europe and North America are intensively polluted by industrial waste from enterprises in various countries that use their water resources.

From 1950 to 1984, the production of mineral fertilizers increased from 13.5 million tons to 121 million tons per year. Their use provided 1/3 of the increase in agricultural production.

At the same time, the use of chemical fertilizers, as well as various chemical plant protection products, has sharply increased in recent decades and has become one of the most important causes of global environmental pollution. Carried by water and air over vast distances, they are included in the geochemical cycle of substances throughout the Earth, often causing significant damage to nature, and to man himself. The rapidly developing process of moving environmentally harmful enterprises to underdeveloped countries has become very characteristic of our time.

Before our eyes, the era of extensive use of the potential of the biosphere is ending. This is confirmed by the following factors:

Today, there is negligibly little undeveloped land left for agriculture.

The area of deserts is systematically increasing. From 1975 to 2000 it increased by 20%.

The reduction in forest cover on the planet is of great concern. From 1950 to 2000, the forest area will decrease by almost 10%, but forests are the lungs of the entire Earth.

Exploitation water pools, including the World Ocean, is carried out on such a scale that nature does not have time to reproduce what people take away.

Climate change is currently occurring as a result of intense human activity.

Compared to the beginning of the last century, the content of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has increased by 30%, and 10% of this increase has occurred in the last 30 years. An increase in its concentration leads to the so-called greenhouse effect, which results in warming of the climate of the entire planet, which, in turn, will cause irreversible processes:

Ice melting;

Rising sea levels by one meter;

Flooding of many coastal areas;

Changes in moisture exchange on the Earth's surface;

Reduced precipitation;

Change in wind direction.

It is clear that such changes will pose huge problems for people related to farming and reproducing the necessary conditions of their lives.

Today, as V.I. Vernadsky was rightly one of the first to note, humanity has acquired such power in transforming the surrounding world that it is beginning to significantly influence the evolution of the biosphere as a whole.

Human economic activity in our time already entails climate change, it affects chemical composition water and air basins of the Earth on the animal and plant world of the planet, on its entire appearance. And this is a tragedy for all humanity as a whole.

CONCLUSION

Tragedy is a harsh word, full of hopelessness. It carries a cold reflection of death, an icy breath emanates from it. But the consciousness of death makes a person more acutely experience all the beauty and bitterness, all the joy and complexity of existence. And when death is near, then in this “borderline” situation all the colors of the world are clearly visible, its aesthetic richness, its sensual charm, the greatness of the familiar, truth and falsehood, good and evil, the very meaning of human existence appear more clearly.

Tragedy is always an optimistic tragedy, in which even death serves life.

So, the tragic reveals:

1. death or severe suffering of a person;

2. the irreplaceability of its loss for people;

3. immortal socially valuable principles inherent in unique individuality, and its continuation in the life of humanity;

4. higher problems of existence, the social meaning of human life;

5. activity of a tragic nature in relation to circumstances;

6. philosophically meaningful state of the world;

7. historically, temporarily unresolvable contradictions;

8. The tragic, embodied in art, has a cleansing effect on people.

The central problem of the tragic work is the expansion of human capabilities, the breaking of those boundaries that have historically developed, but have become cramped for the most courageous and active people inspired by high ideals. The tragic hero paves the way to the future, explodes established boundaries, he is always at the forefront of the struggle of humanity, the greatest difficulties fall on his shoulders. Tragedy reveals the social meaning of life. The essence and purpose of human existence: personal development should not come at the expense, but in the name of the whole society, in the name of humanity. On the other hand, the whole of society should develop in man and through man, and not in spite of him and not at the expense of him. This is the highest aesthetic ideal, this is the path to a humanistic solution to the problem of man and humanity, proposed world history tragic art.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

1. BorevYu. Aesthetics. – M., 2002

2. Bychkov V.V. Aesthetics. – M., 2004

3. Divnenko O. V. Aesthetics. – M., 1995

4. Nikitich L.A. Aesthetics. – M., 2003

Abstract on the topic of the Tragic, its manifestation in art and in life free download

Section: Ethics
Type of work: abstract

Introduction………………………………………………………………………………..3

1. Tragedy – irreparable loss and affirmation of immortality………………..4

2. General philosophical aspects of the tragic……………….………………………...5

3. Tragic in art……………………………………………………….7

4. Tragic in life………………………………………………………..12

Conclusion………………………………………………………………………………….16

References…………………………………………………………………………………18

INTRODUCTION

By aesthetically assessing phenomena, a person determines the extent of his dominance over the world. This measure depends on the level and nature of development of society and its production. The latter reveals one or another meaning for a person of the natural properties of objects, determines their aesthetic properties. This explains that the aesthetic manifests itself in different forms: beautiful, ugly, sublime, base, tragic, comic, etc.

The expansion of human social practice entails an expansion of the range of aesthetic properties and aesthetically assessed phenomena.

There is no era in the history of mankind that is not saturated with tragic events. Man is mortal, and every person living a conscious life cannot help but, in one way or another, comprehend his relationship to death and immortality. Finally, great art, in its philosophical reflections on the world, always internally gravitates towards a tragic theme. The tragic theme runs through the entire history of world art as one of the general themes. In other words, the history of society, the history of art, and the life of the individual in one way or another come into contact with the problem of the tragic. All this determines its importance for aesthetics.

1. TRAGEDY – IRREPAIRABLE LOSS AND ESTABLISHMENT OF IMMORTALITY

The 20th century is the century of the greatest social upheavals, crises, and rapid changes that create the most complex and tense situations in one place or another on the globe. Therefore, a theoretical analysis of the problem of the tragic for us is introspection and comprehension of the world in which we live.

In the art of different nations, tragic death turns into resurrection, and sorrow into joy. For example, ancient Indian aesthetics expressed this pattern through the concept of “samsara,” which means the cycle of life and death, the reincarnation of a deceased person into another living being depending on the nature of the life he lived. The reincarnation of souls among the ancient Indians was associated with the idea of aesthetic improvement, ascent to something more beautiful. The Vedas, the oldest monument of Indian literature, affirmed the beauty of the afterlife and the joy of going into it.

Since ancient times, human consciousness could not come to terms with non-existence. As soon as people began to think about death, they asserted immortality, and in non-existence people made a place for evil and accompanied it there with laughter.

Tragedy is a mournful song about an irreparable loss, a joyful hymn to the immortality of man. It is this deep nature of the tragic that manifests itself when the feeling of sorrow is resolved by joy (“I am happy”), death by immortality.

2. GENERAL PHILOSOPHICAL ASPECTS OF THE TRAGIC

A person dies irreversibly. Death is the transformation of living things into non-living things. However, the dead remains alive in the living: culture stores everything that has passed, it is the extragenetic memory of humanity. G. Heine said that under every tombstone is the history of an entire world that cannot leave without a trace.

Understanding the death of a unique individuality as an irreparable collapse of the whole world, tragedy at the same time affirms the strength and infinity of the universe, despite the departure of a finite being from it. And in this very finite being, tragedy finds immortal traits that unite the personality with the universe, the finite with the infinite. Tragedy is a philosophical art that poses and resolves the highest metaphysical problems of life and death, realizing the meaning of existence, analyzing the global problems of its stability, eternity, infinity, despite constant variability.

In tragedy, as Hegel believed, death is not only annihilation. It also means preserving in a transformed form that which must perish in this form. Hegel contrasts a creature suppressed by the instinct of self-preservation with the idea of liberation from “slave consciousness”, the ability to sacrifice one’s life for higher goals. For Hegel, the ability to comprehend the idea of endless development is the most important characteristic of human consciousness.

K. Marx, already in his early works, criticized Plutarch’s idea of individual immortality, putting forward in contrast to it the idea of social immortality of man. For Marx, people who fear that after their death the fruits of their deeds will go not to them, but to humanity, are untenable. The products of human activity are the best continuation of human life, while hopes for individual immortality are illusory.

In understanding tragic situations in world artistic culture, two extreme positions have emerged: existentialist and Buddhist.

Existentialism made death the central problem of philosophy and art. The German philosopher K. Jaspers emphasizes that knowledge about man is tragic knowledge. In the book “On the Tragic,” he notes that the tragic begins where a person takes all his capabilities to the extreme, knowing that he will die. This is, as it were, the self-realization of the individual at the cost of his own life. “Therefore, in tragic knowledge it is essential what a person suffers from and because of what he dies, what he takes upon himself, in the face of what reality and in what form he betrays his existence.” Jaspers proceeds from the fact that the tragic hero carries within himself both his happiness and his death.

A tragic hero is a bearer of something that goes beyond the scope of individual existence, a bearer of power, a principle, a character, a demon. Tragedy shows a person in his greatness, free from good and evil, writes Jaspers, substantiating this position by referring to Plato’s thought that neither good nor evil flows from a petty character, and a great nature is capable of both great evil and great good.

Tragedy exists where forces collide, each of which considers itself true. On this basis, Jaspers believes that the truth is not unified, that it is split, and tragedy reveals this.

Thus, existentialists absolutize the intrinsic value of the individual and emphasize its isolation from society, which leads their concept to a paradox: the death of the individual ceases to be a social problem. A person left alone with the universe, not feeling humanity around him, is overwhelmed by the horror of the inevitable finitude of existence. She is alienated from people and in fact turns out to be absurd, and her life is devoid of meaning and value.

The death of a person acquires a tragic sound only where a person, having self-worth, lives in the name of people, their interests become the content of his life. In this case, on the one hand, there is a unique individual identity and value of the individual, and on the other, the dying hero finds continuation in the life of society. Therefore, the death of such a hero is tragic and gives rise to a feeling of irretrievable loss of human individuality (and hence grief), and at the same time the idea of the continuation of the life of the individual in humanity arises (and hence the motive of joy).

The source of the tragic is specific social contradictions - collisions between a socially necessary, urgent requirement and the temporary practical impossibility of its implementation. The inevitable lack of knowledge and ignorance often become the source of the greatest tragedies. The tragic is the sphere of understanding world-historical contradictions, the search for a way out for humanity. This category reflects not just the misfortune of a person caused by private problems, but the disasters of humanity, certain fundamental imperfections of existence that affect the fate of the individual.

3. TRAGIC IN ART

Each era brings its own features to the tragic and emphasizes certain aspects of its nature.

For example, Greek tragedy is characterized by an open course of action. The Greeks managed to keep their tragedies entertaining, although both the characters and the audience were often told about the will of the gods or the chorus predicted the further course of events. The audience knew well the plots of ancient myths, on the basis of which tragedies were mainly created. The fascination of Greek tragedy was firmly based on the logic of action. The meaning of the tragedy lay in the character of the hero's behavior. The death and misfortunes of the tragic hero are known. And this is the naivety, freshness and beauty of ancient Greek art. This course of action played a great artistic role, enhancing the tragic emotion of the viewer.

The hero of the ancient tragedy is unable to prevent the inevitable, but he fights, acts, and only through his freedom, through his actions, is what must happen realized. This is, for example, Oedipus in Sophocles’ tragedy “Oedipus the King.” Of his own free will, he consciously and freely searches for the causes of the misfortunes that befell the inhabitants of Thebes. And when it turns out that the “investigation” threatens to turn against the main “investigator” and that the culprit of Thebes’ misfortune is Oedipus himself, who by the will of fate killed his father and married his mother, he does not stop the “investigation”, but brings it to the end. Such is Antigone, the heroine of another tragedy by Sophocles. Unlike her sister Ismene, Antigone does not obey the order of Creon, who, on pain of death, forbids the burial of her brother, who fought against Thebes. The law of tribal relations, expressed in the need to bury the body of a brother, no matter what the cost, applies equally to both sisters, but Antigone becomes a tragic hero because she fulfills this necessity in her free actions.

Greek tragedy is heroic.

The purpose of ancient tragedy is catharsis. The feelings depicted in the tragedy purify the viewer's feelings.

In the Middle Ages, the tragic appears not as heroic, but as martyrdom. Its purpose is consolation. In medieval theater, the passive principle was emphasized in the actor's interpretation of the image of Christ. Sometimes the actor got used to the image of the crucified man so much that he himself found himself close to death.

The concept of catharsis is alien to medieval tragedy. This is not a tragedy of purification, but a tragedy of consolation. It is characterized by logic: you feel bad, but they (the heroes, or rather, the martyrs of the tragedy) are better than you, and they are worse off than you, so take comfort in your suffering in the fact that there are sufferings that are worse, and the torments of people are even less severe, than you who deserve it. Earthly consolation (you are not the only one suffering) is enhanced by otherworldly consolation (there you will not suffer, and you will be rewarded as you deserve).

If in ancient tragedy the most unusual things happen quite naturally, then in medieval tragedy the supernatural nature of what is happening occupies an important place.

At the turn of the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, the majestic figure of Dante rises. Dante has no doubt about the need for the eternal torment of Francesca and Paolo, who with their love violated the moral foundations of their age and the monolith of the existing world order, shaking and transgressing the prohibitions of earth and heaven. And at the same time, in The Divine Comedy there is no supernaturalism or magic. For Dante and his readers, the geography of hell is absolutely real and the hellish whirlwind that carries lovers is real. Here is the same naturalness of the supernatural, the reality of the unreal, which was inherent in ancient tragedy. And it is precisely this return to antiquity on a new basis that makes Dante one of the first exponents of the ideas of the Renaissance.

Medieval man explained the world by God. The man of modern times sought to show that the world is the cause of itself. In philosophy, this was expressed in Spinoza's classic thesis about nature as its own cause. In art, this principle was embodied and expressed by Shakespeare half a century earlier. For him, the whole world, including the sphere of human passions and tragedies, does not need any otherworldly explanation; he himself is at its core.

Romeo and Juliet carry the circumstances of their lives within them. From the characters themselves comes the action. The fatal words: “His name is Romeo: he is the son of Montague, the son of your enemy” - did not change Juliet’s attitude towards her lover. The only measure and driving force of her actions is herself, her character, her love for Romeo.

The Renaissance in its own way solved the problems of love and honor, life and death, personality and society, revealing for the first time the social nature of the tragic conflict. The tragedy during this period revealed the state of the world, confirmed the activity of man and his freedom of will. At the same time, the tragedy of the unregulated personality arose. The only regulation for man was the first and last commandment of the Thelema monastery: “Do what you want” (Rabelais. “Gargartua and Pantagruel”). However, freed from medieval religious morality, the individual sometimes lost all morality, conscience, and honor. Shakespeare's heroes (Othello, Hamlet) are uninhibited and not limited in their actions. And the actions of the forces of evil are just as free and unregulated (Iago, Claudius).

The hopes of humanists that the individual, having gotten rid of medieval restrictions, would use his freedom wisely and in the name of good, turned out to be illusory. The utopia of an unregulated personality in fact turned into its absolute regulation. In France in the 17th century. This regulation manifested itself: in the sphere of politics - in the absolutist state, in the sphere of science and philosophy - in Descartes's teaching about the method that introduces human thought into the mainstream of strict rules, in the sphere of art - in classicism. The tragedy of utopian absolute freedom is replaced by the tragedy of real absolute normative conditioning of the individual.

In the art of romanticism (H. Heine, F. Schiller, J. Byron, F. Chopin), the state of the world is expressed through the state of the spirit. Disappointment in the results of the Great French Revolution and the resulting disbelief in social progress give rise to the world grief characteristic of romanticism. Romanticism realizes that the universal principle may not have a divine, but a diabolical nature and is capable of bringing evil. Byron's tragedies (“Cain”) affirm the inevitability of evil and the eternity of the struggle against it. The embodiment of such universal evil is Lucifer. Cain cannot come to terms with any restrictions on the freedom and power of the human spirit. But evil is omnipotent, and the hero cannot eliminate it from life even at the cost of his death. However, for the romantic consciousness, the struggle is not meaningless: the tragic hero, through his struggle, creates oases of life in the desert, where evil reigns.

The art of critical realism revealed the tragic discord between the individual and society. One of the greatest tragic works of the 19th century. - “Boris Godunov” by A. S. Pushkin. Godunov wants to use power for the benefit of the people. But on the way to power, he commits evil - he kills the innocent Tsarevich Dimitri. And between Boris and the people there was an abyss of alienation, and then anger. Pushkin shows that you cannot fight for the people without the people. Human destiny is the people's destiny; For the first time, the actions of the individual are compared with the good of the people. Such problems are the product of a new era.

The same feature is inherent in the operatic and musical tragic images of M. P. Mussorgsky. His operas “Boris Godunov” and “Khovanshchina” brilliantly embody Pushkin’s formula of tragedy about the unity of human and national destinies. For the first time, a people appeared on the opera stage, animated by a single idea of the struggle against slavery, violence, and tyranny. An in-depth description of the people highlighted the tragedy of Tsar Boris’s conscience. For all his good intentions, Boris remains alien to the people and secretly fears the people, who see him as the cause of their misfortunes. Mussorgsky deeply developed specific musical means of conveying the tragic content of life: musical-dramatic contrasts, bright thematicism, mournful intonations, gloomy tonality and dark timbres of orchestration.

Type of work: abstract

Levandovsky, A.A., Shchetinov, Yu.A. Russian history. XX – beginning of XXI century. – 2003. – p.21-24
Orlov, A.S., Georgiev, V.A., Polunov, A.Yu., Tereshchenko, Yu.Ya. Fundamentals of the Russian history course. – 1997. – p.373-377, 396-404
Chudakova, N.V., Gromov, A.V. I'm exploring the world. Story. - 1998. – p. 430-431
Romanovs. Dynasty in novels. Nicholas II. – 1995. – p.5-7
Mosolov, A.A., At the court of the last Russian emperor. – 1993. – p.109

The tragedy of the individual, family, people in A. A. Akhmatova’s poem Requiem

Type of work: essay

1937 A terrible page in our history. I remember the names: O. Mandelstam, V. Shalamov, A. Solzhenitsyn... Dozens, thousands of names. And behind them are crippled destinies, hopeless grief, fear, despair, oblivion. But human memory is strange. She keeps the most intimate, dear things. And scary...
\"White Clothes\" by V. Dudintsev, \"Children of Arbat\" by A. Rybakov, \"By Right of Memory\" by A. Tvardovsky, \"The Problem of Bread\" by V. Podmogilny, \"The Gulag Archipelago\" by A. Solzhenitsyn - these and others p We angered God and sinned:
Ruler for himself the regicide
We named it.
A. S. Pushkin, \"Boris Godunov\"
Pushkin conceived "Boris Godunov" as a historical and political tragedy. The drama "Boris Godunov" opposed the romantic tradition. As a political tragedy, it addressed contemporary issues: the role of the people in history and the nature of tyrannical power.
If in \"Eugene Onegin\" there is a harmonious composition

The people in the tragedy of A.S. Pushkin Boris Godunov

Type of work: essay

The tragedy "Boris Godunov" was written by Pushkin in 1825. Pushkin was always concerned about the causes of the collapse of the revolutionary and people's liberation movements (in Spain, Italy, Greece). His attention was attracted to such historical figures as Stepan Razin and Emelyan Pugachev. In 1824, Pushkin became very interested in the events of the late 16th - early 17th centuries, when the Russian state was ruled by Boris Godunov, and subsequently by False Dmitry. While studying this material, Pushkin decided to write about

The tragic as a category of aesthetics Categories of aesthetics are fundamental, most general concepts aesthetics, which reflect the essential definitions of cognizable objects and are the key stages of cognition. Aesthetic theory, like any scientific theory, has a certain system of categories. As a category of aesthetics, tragic means a form of dramatic consciousness and a person’s experience of conflict with forces that threaten his existence and lead to the destruction of important spiritual values.

The place of the tragic in the categories of aesthetics CategoryActionSubject of the category BeautifulAesthetic idealArt of the SublimeAesthetic tasteArtistic image TragicAesthetic feelingsCreativity Comic Objective statesSpiritual and practical construction of the world Subject of socio-spiritual life

The subject of the tragic The subject of the tragic action presupposes a heroic personality striving to achieve sublime goals, therefore the category of the tragic is closely related to the category of the sublime. The category of catharsis is inseparable from the tragic, which is not associated only with the field of dramatic art, but has more broad meaning, associated with the socio-psychological impact of art in general. The idea of the tragic was formed in connection with the theory of drama, and in a narrower sense with the theory of tragedy as a type of dramatic art.

Tragic in art The feeling of tragedy is affective in nature, accompanied by strong mental shocks, sometimes expressed in sobs. Created by writer, artist artistic image a person sometimes reaches its highest power: we not only experience an aesthetic feeling from the perception of a beautiful work of art, it makes us suffer, sympathize, and be indignant. Works of art, evoking a feeling of tragedy, ennoble a person, force him to detach himself from the everyday trifles of life, think about its deep foundations, they encourage him to actively fight against the shortcomings of life. But to evoke such a feeling, a work of art must be artistically beautiful.

Tragic in ancient art The hero of ancient tragedy acts in line with necessity. He is unable to prevent the inevitable, but he fights, and it is through his activity that the plot is realized. It is not necessity that draws the ancient hero to the denouement, but through his actions he himself realizes his tragic fate. This is Oedipus in Sophocles' tragedy Oedipus the King. Of his own free will, he consciously and freely searches for the causes of the disasters that befell the inhabitants of Thebes. The hero of the ancient tragedy acts freely even when he understands the inevitability of his death. He is not a doomed creature, but a hero, independently acting in accordance with the will of the gods, according to necessity.

The Tragic in the Art of the Middle Ages In the Middle Ages, the tragic appears not as heroic, but as martyrdom. Here tragedy reveals the supernatural, its purpose is consolation. Unlike Prometheus, the tragedy of Christ is illuminated by martyrdom. In medieval Christian tragedy, the martyrdom, the suffering principle was emphasized in every possible way. Her central characters- martyrs.

Tragic in the Renaissance The Renaissance gave rise to the tragedy of the unregulated individual. The only regulation for a person at that time was the Rabelaisian commandment - do what you want. And then the utopia of an unregulated personality in fact turned into its absolute regulation. In France of the 17th century, this regulation manifested itself in the absolutist state, and in the teachings of Descartes, which introduced human thought into the mainstream of strict rules, and in classicism. The universal principle in the form of the individual’s duty in relation to the state acts as restrictions on his behavior, and these restrictions conflict with the free will of a person, with his passions, desires, and aspirations. This conflict becomes central to the tragedies of Corneille and Racine.

Tragic in Romanticism In the art of romanticism (G. Heine, F. Schiller, J. Byron, F. Chopin), the state of the world is expressed through the state of the spirit. Disappointment in the results of the bourgeois revolution and the resulting disbelief in social progress gives rise to the world sorrow characteristic of romanticism. The tragedies of Byron (Cain) affirm the inevitability of evil and the eternity of the struggle against it. However, for the romantic consciousness, the struggle is not meaningless: the tragic hero does not allow the undivided dominance of evil to be established on earth. With his struggle, he creates oases of life in the desert, where evil reigns.

The Tragic in Critical Realism The art of critical realism revealed the tragic discord between the individual and society. One of the greatest tragic works of the 19th century - Boris Godunov A.S. Pushkin. Godunov wants to use power for the benefit of the people. But, trying to fulfill his intentions, he commits evil - he kills the innocent Tsarevich Dmitry. And between Boris’s actions and the aspirations of the people there was an abyss of alienation. The same feature is inherent in the operatic and musical tragic images of M.P. Mussorgsky. His operas Boris Godunov and Khovanshchina brilliantly embody Pushkin's formula of tragedy about the unity of private and popular destinies. In the literature of critical realism of the 19th century. (Dickens, Balzac, Stendhal, Gogol, etc.) a non-tragic character becomes the hero of tragic situations. And therefore, in art, tragedy as a genre disappears, but as an element it penetrates into all types and genres of art, capturing the intolerance of the discord between man and society.

The pessimistic worldview naturally developed into well-known historical eras- in turning points, when the collapse a certain system life was perceived as proof of the impossibility of the victory of the ideal. But along with pessimistic tragedy in the history of art there has always been another type of tragedy - optimistic tragedy.

Pessimism in the tragic Perfect performance about human life, when faced with a vulgar, ugly reality, he is defeated, leaving not the slightest hope for his revival. And this defeat of the ideal gives rise to tragedy. Such a resolution of a tragic conflict, such a worldview, such a philosophy of life are called pessimistic. Pessimism took especially deep roots at the beginning of the 19th century during the era of romanticism. Social contradictions in the aesthetics of romanticism found their expression in the absolute opposition of ideal and reality.

P. Fedotov Anchor, another anchor Let's remember the small canvas by P. Fedotov Anchor, another anchor. It would seem that what could be tragic about an officer playing with his dog? But, peering and getting used to the picture, we feel that we are captured by a feeling of deep tragedy.

Pieter Bruegel The Blind One of the most stunning artistic expressions of this worldview during the era of the crisis of Renaissance culture was the painting by Pieter Bruegel The Blind. A chain of blind men wandering towards a cliff is perceived as a symbol historical path of all humanity.

Optimism in the tragic Along with pessimistic tragedy in the history of art, there has always been another type of tragedy, the essence of which was very accurately defined by Vsevolod Vishnevsky in the title of his play - Optimistic Tragedy. In Shakespeare's work we meet the first classic designs optimistic tragedy, free from mythological mystifications. The aesthetic meaning of Romeo and Juliet, Hamlet and Othello is that the death wonderful person, embodying the ideal or fighting for it, is not the death of the ideal itself. On the contrary, Shakespeare's tragedies breathe a fierce faith in the inevitable future triumph of reason, justice, beauty free feeling, human trust.

Raphael, “Sistine Madonna” The immortality of Raphael’s Sistine Madonna lies precisely in the fact that the traditional theme of the Madonna and Child was freed by the painter from the religious mysticism so characteristic of the Middle Ages and from the idyllic chanting of maternal happiness, no less characteristic of Renaissance art. Raphael turned this theme into a high optimistic tragedy: a mother carries her son to humanity, anticipating with him his tragic fate and at the same time realizing the necessity and justification of the sacrifice.

Conclusions Thus, the tragic reveals: the death or severe suffering of the individual; the irreplaceability of its loss for people; immortal socially valuable principles inherent in unique individuality, and its continuation in the life of humanity; the highest problems of existence, the social meaning of human life; activity of a tragic nature in relation to circumstances; a philosophically meaningful state of the world; historically, temporarily unresolvable contradictions; the tragic, embodied in art, has a cleansing effect on people. Tragedy reveals the social meaning of life. The essence and purpose of human existence: the development of the individual should not come at the expense, but in the name of the whole society, in the name of humanity. On the other hand, the whole of society must develop in man and through man, and not in spite of him and not at the expense of him. This is the highest aesthetic ideal, this is the path to a humanistic solution to the problem of man and humanity, offered by the world history of tragic art.

Introduction………………………………………………………………………………..3

1. Tragedy – irreparable loss and affirmation of immortality………………..4

2. General philosophical aspects of the tragic……………….………………………...5

3. Tragic in art……………………………………………………….7

4. Tragic in life……………………………………………………………..12

Conclusion………………………………………………………………………………….16

References…………………………………………………………………………………18

INTRODUCTION

The expansion of human social practice entails an expansion of the range of aesthetic properties and aesthetically assessed phenomena.

1. TRAGEDY – IRREPAIRABLE LOSS AND ESTABLISHMENT OF IMMORTALITY

In the art of different nations, tragic death turns into resurrection, and sorrow into joy. For example, ancient Indian aesthetics expressed this pattern through the concept of “samsara,” which means the cycle of life and death, the reincarnation of a deceased person into another living being, depending on the nature of the life he lived. The reincarnation of souls among the ancient Indians was associated with the idea of aesthetic improvement, ascent to something more beautiful. The Vedas, the oldest monument of Indian literature, affirmed the beauty of the afterlife and the joy of going into it.

2. GENERAL PHILOSOPHICAL ASPECTS OF THE TRAGIC

Understanding the death of a unique individuality as an irreparable collapse of the whole world, tragedy at the same time affirms the strength and infinity of the universe, despite the departure of a finite being from it. And in this very finite being, tragedy finds immortal traits that unite the personality with the universe, the finite with the infinite. Tragedy is a philosophical art that poses and resolves the highest metaphysical problems of life and death, realizing the meaning of existence, analyzing the global problems of its stability, eternity, infinity, despite constant variability.

In tragedy, as Hegel believed, death is not only annihilation. It also means preserving in a transformed form that which must perish in this form. Hegel contrasts a creature suppressed by the instinct of self-preservation with the idea of liberation from “slave consciousness”, the ability to sacrifice one’s life for higher goals. For Hegel, the ability to comprehend the idea of endless development is the most important characteristic of human consciousness.

In understanding tragic situations in world artistic culture, two extreme positions have emerged: existentialist and Buddhist.

Existentialism made death the central problem of philosophy and art. The German philosopher K. Jaspers emphasizes that knowledge about man is tragic knowledge. In the book “On the Tragic,” he notes that the tragic begins where a person takes all his capabilities to the extreme, knowing that he will die. It’s like self-realization of the individual at the cost of his own life. “Therefore, in tragic knowledge it is essential what a person suffers from and because of what he dies, what he takes upon himself, in the face of what reality and in what form he betrays his existence.” Jaspers proceeds from the fact that the tragic hero carries within himself both his happiness and his death.

Tragedy exists where forces collide, each of which considers itself true. On this basis, Jaspers believes that the truth is not unified, that it is split, and tragedy reveals this.

The source of the tragic is specific social contradictions - collisions between a socially necessary, urgent requirement and the temporary practical impossibility of its implementation. The inevitable lack of knowledge and ignorance often become the source of the greatest tragedies. The tragic is the sphere of understanding world-historical contradictions, the search for a way out for humanity. This category reflects not just the misfortune of a person caused by private problems, but the disasters of humanity, certain fundamental imperfections of existence that affect the fate of the individual.

3. TRAGIC IN ART

Each era brings its own features to the tragic and emphasizes certain aspects of its nature.

Lesson on MHC on the topic: “Tragic in art” 9th grade

describes the hero's suffering or death

individual point of view is opposed to the generally accepted one

death serves life. Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet

Each era brings its own features to the tragic and most clearly emphasizes certain aspects of its nature.

(8th century BC - 5th century AD)

Catharsis - feelings,

depicted in the tragedy, purify the viewer’s feelings.

Heroes have knowledge of the future. Divinations

Predictions, prophetic dreams, prophetic words of gods and oracles. Tragic as heroic. Necessity was realized through the free action of the hero.

Sophocles' tragedy "Oedipus the King"

Middle Ages

Solace in Spirituality

supernaturalness, miraculousness of what is happening. Necessity as the will of providence.

Dante " The Divine Comedy»

Renaissance

Freedom of the individual

The problem of personal choice

Shakespeare "Romeo and Juliet"

Modern times 17.-18 centuries.

A man's duty

Social restrictions in conflict with human free will, with his passions and desires

Romanticism 19th century

The death of a hero during a riot

Byron "Cain"

Critical realism of the 19th century - 20th century.

Social meaning of human life

Motives for the heroes' actions

rooted not in their personal whims, but in the historical movement (man and history).

Sholokhov "Quiet Don"

Greek tragedy an open course of action is inherent. The Greeks managed to keep their tragedies entertaining, although both the characters and the audience were often told about the will of the gods or the chorus predicted the further course of events. Yes, the audience knew well the plots of ancient myths, on the basis of which tragedies were mainly created. The entertainment of Greek tragedy was firmly based not so much on unexpected plot twists, but on the logic of action. The meaning of the tragedy lay not in the necessary and fatal outcome, but in the character of the hero’s behavior. Thus, the springs of the plot and the results of the action are exposed. The death and misfortunes of the tragic hero are known. And this is the naivety, freshness and beauty of ancient Greek art. This course of action played a great artistic role, enhancing the tragic emotion of the viewer. For example, Euripides “informed the viewer much earlier about all the disasters that were about to break out over his head characters, trying to inspire compassion for them even when they themselves were far from considering themselves deserving of compassion.” (G. E. Lessing. Selected works. M., 1953, p. 555).

The heroes of ancient tragedy often have knowledge of the future. Divinations, predictions, prophetic dreams, prophetic words of gods and oracles - all this organically enters the world of tragedy, without removing or dulling the viewer’s interest. “Entertainment” and interest for the viewer in Greek tragedy were firmly based not so much on unexpected plot twists, but on the logic of action. The whole point of the tragedy was not in the necessary and fatal outcome, but in the character of the hero’s behavior. What matters here is what happens, and especially how it happens.

The hero of the ancient tragedy acts in line with necessity. He is unable to prevent the inevitable, but he fights, acts, and only through his freedom, through his actions, is what must happen realized. It is not necessity that draws the ancient hero to the denouement, but he himself brings it closer, realizing his tragic fate.

This is Oedipus in Sophocles’ tragedy “Oedipus the King.” Such is Antigone, the heroine of another tragedy by Sophocles. Unlike her sister Ismene, Antigone does not obey the order of Creon, who, on pain of death, forbids the burial of her brother, who fought against Thebes. The law of tribal relations, expressed in the need to bury the body of a brother, no matter what the cost, applies equally to both sisters, but Antigone becomes a tragic hero because she fulfills this necessity in her free actions.

For a medieval tragedy consolation is characterized by logic: you feel bad, but they (the heroes, or rather, the martyrs of the tragedy) are better than you, and they are worse off than you, so take comfort in your suffering in the fact that there is suffering more bitter, and torment is worse for people even less than you who deserve it. Earthly consolation (you are not the only one suffering) is enhanced by otherworldly consolation (there you will not suffer and you will be rewarded according to your deserts). If in ancient tragedy the most unusual things happen quite naturally, then in medieval tragedy an important place is occupied by the supernatural, the miraculousness of what is happening.

Dante's there is no doubt about the necessity of eternal torment for Francesca and Paolo, who with their love violated the moral foundations of their age and the monolith of the existing world order, shaking and transgressing the prohibitions of earth and heaven. And at the same time, the second “pillar” is missing in The Divine Comedy aesthetic system medieval tragedy, supernaturalism, magic. For Dante and his readers, the geography of hell is absolutely real and the hellish whirlwind that carries lovers is real. Here is the same naturalness of the supernatural, the reality of the unreal, which was inherent in ancient tragedy. And it is precisely this return to antiquity on a new basis that makes Dante one of the first exponents of the ideas of the Renaissance.

Dante's tragic sympathy for Francesca and Paolo is much more open than that of the nameless author of the tale of Tristan and Isolde for his heroes. For the latter, this sympathy is contradictory, inconsistent, it is often either replaced by moral condemnation, or explained by reasons of a magical nature (sympathy for people who drank a magic potion). Dante directly, openly, based on the promptings of his heart, sympathizes with Paolo and Francesca, although he considers it immutable that they should be doomed to eternal torment, and reveals touchingly the martyrdom (and not heroic) nature of their tragedy:

The spirit spoke, tormented by terrible oppression, Another wept, and the torment of their hearts

My brow was covered with mortal sweat; And I fell like a dead man falls.

(Dante Alighieri. “The Divine Comedy”. Ad. M., 1961, p. 48).

For Shakespeare the whole world, including the sphere of human passions and tragedies, does not need any otherworldly explanation; it is not based on evil fate, not God, not magic or evil spells. The reason for the world, the reasons for its tragedies, is in himself.

Romeo and Juliet carry the circumstances of their lives within them. From the characters themselves comes the action. The fatal words: “His name is Romeo: he is the son of Montague, the son of your enemy” - did not change Juliet’s attitude towards her lover. It is not constrained by any external regulatory principles. The only measure and driving force of her actions is herself, her character, her love for Romeo.

The Renaissance in its own way solved the problems of love and honor, life and death, personality and society, for the first time revealing the social nature of the tragic conflict.

The tragedy during this period revealed the state of the world, confirmed the activity of man and his freedom of will. The tragic hero acts in accordance with the need to fulfill himself, regardless of any circumstances. The hero of the tragedy acts freely, choosing the direction and goals of his actions. And in this sense, his activity, his own character is the reason for his death. The tragic outcome is inherent in the personality itself. External circumstances can only manifest or not manifest the properties of a tragic hero, but the reason for his actions lies in himself. Consequently, he carries his own death within himself, the tragic guilt lies on him.

Romanticism realizes that the universal principle may have a non-divine, diabolical nature and is capable of bringing evil. Byron's tragedies (“Cain”) affirm the inevitability of evil and the eternity of the struggle against it. The embodiment of such universal evil is Lucifer. Cain cannot come to terms with any restrictions on the freedom and power of the human spirit. The meaning of his life is in rebellion, in active confrontation eternal evil, in an effort to violently change their position in the world. Evil is omnipotent, and the hero cannot eliminate it from life even at the cost of his death. However, for the romantic consciousness the struggle is not meaningless:

the tragic hero does not allow the undivided dominance of evil to be established on earth. With his struggle, he creates oases of life in the desert, where evil reigns.

Faced with the formidable state of the world, his struggle and even death, the hero makes a breakthrough to a higher, more perfect state. The hero’s personal responsibility for his free, active action, reflected in the Hegelian category of tragic guilt, in M. A. Sholokhov’s interpretation has risen to historical responsibility. The theme of the individual’s responsibility to history is deeply explored in “Quiet Flows the Don.” The world-historical context of a person’s actions turns him into a conscious or unwilling participant historical process. This makes the hero responsible for choosing the path, for correctly solving the issues of life and understanding its meaning. The character of the tragic hero is verified by the very course of history, its laws. The character of Sholokhov's hero is contradictory: he either becomes shallow, then deepens with internal torment, or is tempered by difficult trials. Its fate is tragic: the hurricane sinks to the ground and leaves the thin and weak birch tree unharmed, but uproots the mighty oak tree.

In order for tragedy to cease to be a constant companion of social life, society must become humane and come into harmonious harmony with the individual. A person’s desire to overcome discord with the world, the search for the lost meaning of life - this is the concept of the tragic and the pathos of the development of this topic in critical realism of the 20th century. (E. Hemingway, W. Faulkner, L. Frank, G. Böll, F. Fellini, M. Antonioni, J. Gershwin and others).