ENGLISH LITERATURE (CBSE/UGC NET)

Detailed explanation-1: -Aristotle compares the plot of a tragedy to a living organism and says that just as in a living organism every part is harmoniously related to each other, and to the whole, so in tragedy also the various incidents and events must bear a proportionate and harmonious relationship.

Detailed explanation-2: -By plot Aristotle means the arrangement of incidents. Incidents mean action, and tragedy is an imitation of actions, both internal and external. That is to say that it also imitates the mental processes of the dramatic personae.

Detailed explanation-3: -Aristotle described the basic triangle-shaped plot structure, which has a beginning, middle, and end. CHARACTER revealed by ACTION. Gustav Freytag was a 19th-century German playwright and novelist who saw common patterns in the plots of stories and novels and developed a diagram to analyze them.

Detailed explanation-4: -Aristotle listed character as secondary to plot because “character determines man’s qualities, but it is by their action that they are happy or the reverse.” Thus, character comes in as subsidiary to the actions or plot. Without a compelling plot, there is no action or reaction that will create a compelling character.

Detailed explanation-5: -A successful plot relies on the discernment of the poet, who must identify that set and sequence of events that can be presented to the audience as a whole. The test of the unity of a plot is that no part can be removed without changing and distorting the meaning of the whole.