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A tragic hero is the main character in a tragedy
Tragedy

Tragedy is a form of The arts based on human suffering that offers its audience pleasure. While most cultures have developed forms that provoke this paradoxical response, tragedy refers to a specific Poetic tradition of drama that has played a unique and important role historically in the self-definition of Western culture....
 who makes an error
Hamartia

Hamartia is a term developed by Aristotle in his work Poetics . The term can simply be seen as a character?s flaw or error. The word hamartia is rooted in the notion of missing the mark and covers a broad spectrum that includes accident and mistake, as well as wrongdoing, error, or sin.....
 in his or her actions that leads to his or her downfall. Tragic heroes appear in the drama
Drama

Drama is the specific Mode of fiction Mimesis in performance. The term comes from a Ancient Greek word meaning "Action " , which is derived from "to do" ....
tic works of Aeschylus
Aeschylus

Aeschylus was an Ancient Greece playwright. He is often recognized as the father or the founder of tragedy, and is the earliest of the three Greek tragedy whose Play survive extant, the others being Sophocles and Euripides....
, Sophocles
Sophocles

Sophocles was the second of the three classical Greece tragedy whose work has survived. His first plays were written later than those of Aeschylus and earlier than those of Euripides....
, Euripides
Euripides

Euripides was the last of the three great tragedy of classical Athens . Ancient scholars thought that Euripides had written ninety-five plays, although four of those were probably written by Critias....
, Seneca
Seneca

Seneca may refer to: ...
, Marlowe
Christopher Marlowe

Christopher "Kit" Marlowe was an Kingdom of England Playwright, poet and translator of the Elizabethan era. The foremost English Renaissance theatre tragedy next to William Shakespeare, he is known for his blank verse, his overreaching protagonists, and his own mysterious and untimely death....
, Shakespeare
William Shakespeare

William Shakespeare was an English people poet and playwright, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's preeminent dramatist....
, Webster
John Webster

John Webster was an England Literature in English#Jacobean literature dramatist best known for his tragedies The White Devil and The Duchess of Malfi, often regarded as masterpieces of the early 17th-century English stage....
, Marston
John Marston

John Marston was an English people poet, playwright and satirist during the late Elizabethan and Literature in English#Jacobean literature periods....
, Corneille
Pierre Corneille

File:Pierre Corneille 3.jpgPierre Corneille was a French tragedy who was one of the three great seventeenth Century French dramatists, along with Moli?re and Jean Racine....
, Racine
Jean Racine

Jean Racine was a France dramatist, one of the "big three" of 17th century France , and one of the most important literary figures in the Western tradition....
, Goethe, Schiller
Friedrich Schiller

Johann Christoph Friedrich von Schiller [johan/jo?han kr?st?f fri?t??? f?n ??l??/??l?] was a Germany poet, philosopher, historian, and playwright....
, Kleist
Kleist

Kleist, or von Kleist, is a surname.von Kleist:*Ewald J?rgen Georg von Kleist , co-inventor of the Leyden jar*Ewald Christian von Kleist , German poet and soldier...
, Strindberg, and many other writers.
common traits characteristic of a tragic protagonist
Protagonist

A protagonist is the main Character of a drama or Narrative. The word "protagonist" derives from the Greek language p??ta????st?? , "one who plays the first part, chief actor." In the theatre of Ancient Greece, three actors played all of the main dramatic roles in a tragedy; the leading role was played by the protagonist, while the othe...
:


he modernist
Modernism

Modernism, in its broadest definition, is modern thought, character, or practice. More specifically, the term describes both a set of cultural tendencies and an array of associated cultural movements, originally arising from wide-scale and far-reaching changes to Western culture in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century....
 era a new kind of tragic hero was synthesized as a reaction to the English Renaissance
English Renaissance

The English Renaissance was a Cultural movement and Art movement in England dating from the early 16th century to the early 17th century. It is associated with the pan-European Renaissance that many cultural historians believe originated in northern Italy in the 14th century....
, the Age of Enlightenment, and Romanticism
Romanticism

Romanticism is a complex artistic, literary, and intellectual movement that originated in the second half of the 18th century in Western Europe, and gained strength during the Industrial Revolution....
.






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A tragic hero is the main character in a tragedy
Tragedy

Tragedy is a form of The arts based on human suffering that offers its audience pleasure. While most cultures have developed forms that provoke this paradoxical response, tragedy refers to a specific Poetic tradition of drama that has played a unique and important role historically in the self-definition of Western culture....
 who makes an error
Hamartia

Hamartia is a term developed by Aristotle in his work Poetics . The term can simply be seen as a character?s flaw or error. The word hamartia is rooted in the notion of missing the mark and covers a broad spectrum that includes accident and mistake, as well as wrongdoing, error, or sin.....
 in his or her actions that leads to his or her downfall. Tragic heroes appear in the drama
Drama

Drama is the specific Mode of fiction Mimesis in performance. The term comes from a Ancient Greek word meaning "Action " , which is derived from "to do" ....
tic works of Aeschylus
Aeschylus

Aeschylus was an Ancient Greece playwright. He is often recognized as the father or the founder of tragedy, and is the earliest of the three Greek tragedy whose Play survive extant, the others being Sophocles and Euripides....
, Sophocles
Sophocles

Sophocles was the second of the three classical Greece tragedy whose work has survived. His first plays were written later than those of Aeschylus and earlier than those of Euripides....
, Euripides
Euripides

Euripides was the last of the three great tragedy of classical Athens . Ancient scholars thought that Euripides had written ninety-five plays, although four of those were probably written by Critias....
, Seneca
Seneca

Seneca may refer to: ...
, Marlowe
Christopher Marlowe

Christopher "Kit" Marlowe was an Kingdom of England Playwright, poet and translator of the Elizabethan era. The foremost English Renaissance theatre tragedy next to William Shakespeare, he is known for his blank verse, his overreaching protagonists, and his own mysterious and untimely death....
, Shakespeare
William Shakespeare

William Shakespeare was an English people poet and playwright, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's preeminent dramatist....
, Webster
John Webster

John Webster was an England Literature in English#Jacobean literature dramatist best known for his tragedies The White Devil and The Duchess of Malfi, often regarded as masterpieces of the early 17th-century English stage....
, Marston
John Marston

John Marston was an English people poet, playwright and satirist during the late Elizabethan and Literature in English#Jacobean literature periods....
, Corneille
Pierre Corneille

File:Pierre Corneille 3.jpgPierre Corneille was a French tragedy who was one of the three great seventeenth Century French dramatists, along with Moli?re and Jean Racine....
, Racine
Jean Racine

Jean Racine was a France dramatist, one of the "big three" of 17th century France , and one of the most important literary figures in the Western tradition....
, Goethe, Schiller
Friedrich Schiller

Johann Christoph Friedrich von Schiller [johan/jo?han kr?st?f fri?t??? f?n ??l??/??l?] was a Germany poet, philosopher, historian, and playwright....
, Kleist
Kleist

Kleist, or von Kleist, is a surname.von Kleist:*Ewald J?rgen Georg von Kleist , co-inventor of the Leyden jar*Ewald Christian von Kleist , German poet and soldier...
, Strindberg, and many other writers.

Common traits

Some common traits characteristic of a tragic protagonist
Protagonist

A protagonist is the main Character of a drama or Narrative. The word "protagonist" derives from the Greek language p??ta????st?? , "one who plays the first part, chief actor." In the theatre of Ancient Greece, three actors played all of the main dramatic roles in a tragedy; the leading role was played by the protagonist, while the othe...
:
  • The hero discovers his fate by his own actions, not by things happening to him.
  • The hero sees and understands his doom, and that his fate was revealed by his own actions.
  • The hero's downfall is understood by Aristotle
    Aristotle

    Aristotle was a Greeks philosopher, a student of Plato and teacher of Alexander the Great. He wrote on many subjects, including physics, metaphysics, Poetics , theater, music, logic, rhetoric, politics, government, ethics, biology and zoology....
     to arouse pity and fear.
  • The hero is physically or spiritually wounded by his experiences, often resulting in his death.
  • A tragic hero is often of noble birth, or rises to noble standing (King Arthur
    King Arthur

    King Arthur is a legendary Britons leader who, according to medieval histories and Romance , led the defence of Britain against the Saxon invaders in the early 6th century....
    , Okonkwo
    Okonkwo

    Okonkwo is the protagonist of Chinua Achebe's 1958 novel, Things Fall Apart. He is a rash, strong warrior who acts upon impulse. His name means "baby boy born on "Nkwo" market day in Ibo and he is the first in a series of tragic heroes Chinua Achebe wrote about from that kingdom in his rare novels....
    , the main character in Achebe's novel, Things Fall Apart
    Things Fall Apart

    Things Fall Apart is a 1958 in literature English-language novel by Nigerian author Chinua Achebe. It is a staple book in schools throughout Africa and widely read and studied in English-speaking countries around the world....
    .)
  • The hero learns something from his/her mistake.
  • The hero is faced with a serious decision.
  • The suffering of the hero is meaningful.
  • There may sometimes be supernatural involvement (in Shakespeare's Julius Caesar
    Julius Caesar (play)

    Julius Caesar is a Shakespearean tragedy by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written in 1599. It portrays the conspiracy against the Roman Empire dictator Julius Caesar, his assassination and its aftermath....
    , Caesar is warned of his death via Calpurnia's vision and Brutus is warned of his impending death by the ghost of Caesar).
  • The Shakespearean tragic hero dies at some point in the story, for example Macbeth
    Macbeth

    Macbeth is a tragedy by William Shakespeare about a regicide and its aftermath. It is Shakespeare's shortest Shakespearean tragedy and is believed to have been written some time between 1603 and 1606, with 1607 being the very latest possible date....
    . Shakespeare's characters illustrate that tragic heroes are neither fully good nor fully evil. Through the development of the plot a hero's mistakes, rather than his quintessential goodness or evil, lead to his tragic downfall.
  • The hero of classical tragedies is almost universally male. Later tragedies (like Shakespeare's Antony and Cleopatra
    Antony and Cleopatra

    Antony and Cleopatra is a tragedy by William Shakespeare. It was first printed in the First Folio of 1623.The plot is based on Thomas North's translation of Plutarch's Life of Markus Antonius and follows the relationship between Cleopatra VII of Egypt and Mark Antony from the time of the Roman-Persian Wars to Cleopatra's suicide....
    ) introduced the female tragic hero. Portrayals of female tragic heroes are notable because they are rare.


Famous tragic heroes

  • Macbeth
    Macbeth (character)

    Macbeth is the main character in Shakespeare?s Macbeth . The character was based upon accounts found in Holinshed's Chronicles , a history of Britain....
  • Othello
    Othello (character)

    Othello is a character in Shakespeare's Othello . The character's origin is traced to the tale, "Un Capitano Moro" in Gli Hecatommithi by Cinthio....
  • King Lear
    King Lear

    King Lear is a tragedy by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written between 1603 and 1606, and is considered one of his greatest works....
  • Oedipus
    Oedipus

    Oedipus was a Greek mythology monarch of Thebes, Greece. He fulfilled a prophecy that said he would kill his father and marry his mother, and thus brought disaster on his city and family....
  • Hamlet
    Prince Hamlet

    Prince Hamlet is the protagonist in Shakespeare's Shakespearean tragedy Hamlet. He is the Prince of Denmark, nephew to the usurping King Claudius and son of the previous King of Denmark, King Hamlet....
  • Richard III
    Richard III

    Richard III may refer to:*Richard III of England**Richard III , a play by William Shakespeare***Richard III , a USA film***Richard III , a UK/USA film starring Ian McKellen...
  • Brutus
    Marcus Junius Brutus

    File:Portrait Brutus Massimo.jpgMarcus Junius Brutus or Quintus Servilius Caepio Brutus, often referred to simply as Brutus, was a Roman Senate of the late Roman Republic....
  • Doctor Faustus
    Doctor Faustus

    Doctor Faustus could refer to:*The character of Faust*Christopher Marlowe's The Tragical History of Doctor Faustus*Goethe's Faust*Thomas Mann's Doktor Faustus...
  • Antigone
    Antigone

    Antigone is the name of two different women in Greek mythology. The name may be taken to mean "unbending", coming from "anti-" and "-gon / -gony" , but has also been suggested to mean "opposed to motherhood" or "in place of a mother" based from the root gone, "that which generates" ....
  • Romeo Montague
    Romeo Montague

    Romeo Montague is one of the fictional protagonists in William Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet. He is the heir of the Montague family of Verona, and falls in love and dies with Juliet Capulet, the daughter of the Capulet house....
  • Juliet Capulet
    Juliet Capulet

    Juliet Capulet is one of the title characters in William Shakespeare's tragedy Romeo and Juliet. The story has a long history that precedes Shakespeare himself....
  • Heracles
    Heracles

    In Greek mythology, Heracles or Herakles meaning "glory of Hera", or "Glorious through Hera" Alcides or Alcaeus " was a hero, the son of Zeus and Alcmene, foster son of Amphitryon and great-grandson of Perseus....
  • Hedda Gabler
    Hedda Gabler

    Hedda Gabler is a Play first published in 1890 by Norwegian playwright Henrik Ibsen. The play premiered in 1891 in Germany to negative reviews, but has subsequently gained recognition as a classic of Realism , nineteenth century theatre, and Drama ....
  • Othello
    Othello

    Othello, the Moor of Venice is a tragedy by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written in approximately 1603, and based on the Italian language short story "Un Capitano Moro" by Cinthio first published in 1565....


Modern tragic heroes

In the modernist
Modernism

Modernism, in its broadest definition, is modern thought, character, or practice. More specifically, the term describes both a set of cultural tendencies and an array of associated cultural movements, originally arising from wide-scale and far-reaching changes to Western culture in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century....
 era a new kind of tragic hero was synthesized as a reaction to the English Renaissance
English Renaissance

The English Renaissance was a Cultural movement and Art movement in England dating from the early 16th century to the early 17th century. It is associated with the pan-European Renaissance that many cultural historians believe originated in northern Italy in the 14th century....
, the Age of Enlightenment, and Romanticism
Romanticism

Romanticism is a complex artistic, literary, and intellectual movement that originated in the second half of the 18th century in Western Europe, and gained strength during the Industrial Revolution....
. The modern hero, rather than falling calamitously from a high position, begins the story appearing to be an ordinary, average person; for example, Arthur Miller's
Arthur Miller

Arthur Miller was an United States playwright and essayist. He was a prominent figure in Theater in the United States and film for almost 100 years, writing a wide variety of dramas, including celebrated Play such as The Crucible, A View from the Bridge, All My Sons, and Death of a Salesman, which are studied and performed w...
 Joe Keller in All My Sons
All My Sons

All My Sons is a 1947 Play by Arthur Miller. The play was twice adapted for film; in 1948, and again in 1986.The play, which opened on Broadway theatre at the Coronet Theatre in New York, New York on January 29, 1947, closed on November 8, 1947 and ran for 328 performances, was awarded the 1947 Tony Award for Best Authored Play....
 (1947) is an average man, which serves to illustrate Miller's belief that all people, not just the nobility
Nobility

Nobility is a government-privileged title which may be either hereditary or for a lifetime. Titles of nobility exist today in many countries although it is usually associated with present or former monarchies....
, are affected by materialistic
Economic materialism

Materialism refers to how a person or group chooses to spend their factors of production, particularly money and time. Literally, a materialist is a person for whom collecting material goods is an important priority....
 and capitalist
Capitalism

Capitalism is an economic system in which wealth, and the means of producing wealth, are private property and controlled rather than commonly, publicly, or state-owned and controlled....
 values. The modern hero's story does not require the protagonist
Protagonist

A protagonist is the main Character of a drama or Narrative. The word "protagonist" derives from the Greek language p??ta????st?? , "one who plays the first part, chief actor." In the theatre of Ancient Greece, three actors played all of the main dramatic roles in a tragedy; the leading role was played by the protagonist, while the othe...
 to have the traditional catharsis
Catharsis

Catharsis is a Ancient Greek word meaning "purification", "cleansing" or "clarification." It is derived from the infinitive verb of Transliteration as kathairein "to purify, purge," and adjective katharos "pure or clean."...
 to bring the story to a close. He may die without an epiphany of his destiny and he may suffer without the ability to change events that are happening to him. The story may end without closure and even without the death of the hero. This new hero of modernism is the antihero and may not be considered by all to even be a tragic hero.