Modern Tragedy

One of my favorite aspects of literature is modern tragedy, which I believe, in any analytical posts I do, I will often touch upon, so why not define it?

A Modern Tragedy

Modern tragedy emerges above classical, Shakespearian, and Greek tragedy through one simple word: flexibility. Where as classical and Greek tragedies limit themselves to the rise and downfall of a Heroic figure, such as a king, the modern tragedy depicts the tragic struggle of a common man. This common man suffers and decades with his society, often loosing values, morals or traditions. This common man, though some may take liberty to reference as a tragic hero, embodies all but heroism. He is no savior of society, but finds himself stuck in the past, fixated on a preconceived image of society which he attempts to save from the overall decline, or arguably simple change of society. In this sense, our "common man" or tragic common hero, immutably clings to a society for which his life and power is invested -- his constant need for ingratiation, by all but submissive actions, is at the rudimentary foundation for his tragic flaw to build upon.

A tragic common man's quest for worth or justification in society in the paramount cause of his downward spiral. Accompany his quest, a tragic flaw -- in Chinua Achebe's Things Fall Apart it was Oknonkwo's trait as a man of action and not words; in the The Great Gatsby it was Gatsby's fixation on the past accompanied by his unrealistic romanticist values pitted against the decadence and moral mutations of the roaring twenties; in Steinbeck's The Pearl Kino's tragic flaw was his fixation on a better future, on wealth and the White man's dream. Generally speaking, the tragic flaw is not in all aspects tragic. The common man's tragic flaw is critically credible for his rise to power in a "old society", but as a new one emerges, and society changes, the traits that led to this common man's achievement of power or social justification are inseperable from those that lead to his downfall as attempts to cling to to this high status which only exists in the old society.

This brings us to the notion of societal tragedy. The common man's struggle fits into a larger image, and the grander progression of mankind. It is this tragic common hero's inability to see change as positive which leads the reader to believe his society is undergoing a tragedy as well. If viewed with an image of generic judgment we, the readers, must decide, is this common man a hero attempting to preserve culture, and his tragedy his failure, or is it all common men's decisions as a whole to progress and change, by factors out of their control, the tragedy? Novelists such as Chinua Achebe, Earnest Hemingway, John Steinbeck, and Tennesee Williams, among others, expertly formulate this question and examine both.