Hamartia Research Papers Samples For Students

Introduction

Oedipus tragedy is predicted even before his birth in the oracle of Apollo at Delphi, as his father, Laius, will meet his fatal death in his hand and he will marry his own mother, Jocasta, when he grows up. The oracle is the major reason for his parents to infanticide him. Aristotle, the great Greek philosopher, adverts Oedipus as a best example of tragic hero ever. Aristotle’s panorama about Oedipus is vividly described in the following lines: “must be one who is highly renowned and prosperous-a personage like Oedipus” (Poetics XIII paragraph 2) and “he who hears the tale ...

According to the ancient Greeks, a hero was an immortal religious figure that had received cult honors and was anticipated to come back, so to bring prosperity to the entire community (that worshiped the hero), including the animals and the fertility of the crops (Nagy). However, a hero could also be a mortal, hence a literary figure, whose life had to undergo an ordeal, in order to receive immortalization after he dies (Nagy).
Born with a heavy legacy already on his shoulders, Oedipus spent his entire life trying to avert an ominous prophecy that placed him as the person that would kill his ...

The main characters of Shakespeare’s works are usually somewhat tragic in nature – they often end with something bad befalling them because of dramatic irony. With his play Othello, the eponymous figure is a tragic one, in which the fact that he is of a different race leads Iago and others to plot against him and bring about his downfall. Shakespeare’s Othello is shown to be a heroic African figure adopted by the Romans, perpetually battling the prejudices of others to get by in his own work and life, just to be taken down by a villainous figure who is afraid of ...