+ Greek tragedy focused on a person of noble birth who in some cases had risen to a great height and then fell precipitaely.
+ Tragedies showed humans at the mercy of MOIRA, their fate, which they only partly understood.
+ One objective of Greek drama was to have the audience experience a CATHARSIS, which Aristoltle describes as a purging or purifying of the emotions of pity and fear.
+According to the Greeks, these are emotions that a person associates with the fall of someone in a high social station, such as a king or queen.
+ A central character, or Protagonist, of noble birth was therefore an essential element for the playwright striving to evoke catharsis in an audience.
+Twentieth-century experiments with tragic figures who are ordinary people, such as Arthur Miller's Death of Salesman, as masterful as they are, would not have made sense to the greeks.
+For the Greeks, tragedy could befall only the great.
+The tragic figure for whom the play is usually named, experiences three stages of development: purpose, passion, and perception.
+The play begins with a purpose, such as finding the source of the plague in Oedipus Rex.
+ According to Aristotle, the tragic hero's perception of the truth was the most intense moment in drama. When it came at the same moment that the tragic figure's fortunes reversed.
+ Aristotle felt that the tragedy was most fulfilling for the audience
.