A tragedy by definition is "a drama which recounts an important and casually related series of events in the life of a person of significance, such events culminating in an unhappy catastrophe, the whole treated with great dignity

and seriousness". The Greek tragedies are plays based on myths which were well known and enjoyed by audiences. Most of the plays encompassed certain elements that Aristotle identified in his Poetics. The five Aristotelian elements for a tragedy are: 1. The tragedy must make the audience feel fear and pity toward the

actions that take place on stage, and the play should inspire the audience to live better lives; 2. The hero must be of high importance in his society (king, god, etc.), and possess a tragic flaw; 3.There must be a change of fortune involving a reversal; 4. The plays must be written in the forma

generally accepted that most tragedies end unhappily and contain a significant amount of dramatic irony.

and also contains all the parts of a Greek play such as a Prologue, a Parados, an Episoda and Stasima, as well as an Exodus. In the prologue, Oedipus is introduced as the King of Thebes (which means he has a very high role in his society) and has just learned the reason that his kingdom has been cursed with a devastating plague. The gods have cursed Thebes because the murderer of the former King, Laius, was never punished. Oedipus vows to avenge the death of Laius by finding and killing the murderer. This is ironic because Oedipus is the killer of Laius, and the audience knows this because they are already familiar with mythological background. This type of irony is known as dramatic irony, which is an important element in any Greek tragedy. The reversal in this play is most defi

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Approximate Pages = 2 (250 words per page double spaced)