Why Does Tragedy Give Pleasure [Paperback]

Whydoestragedy give pleasure? Why do people who are neither wicked nor depraved enjoy watching plays about suffering and death? Is it because we see horrific matter controlled by majestic art? Or because tragedy actually reaches out to the dark side of human nature? Nuttall's wide-ranging, lively, and engaging book offers a new answer to this perennial question. Writers discussed include Aristotle, Shakespeare, Nietzsche, and Freud.

1. Aristotle and After
2. Enter Freud
3. The Game of Death
4. King Lear
Index

Why Does Tragedy Give Pleasure?offers a highly engaging discussion of its title question and a very suggestive answer....I would recommend that any one who wants to take his or her own run at the problem of tragedy should first spend some time engaging with the arguments inWhy Does Tragedy givePleasure?. --Review

This delightful little book not only attracts the reader with its enigmatic title, it ensnares her into following its argument like a detective story, whose solution is not disclosed before its final pages. In a style more reminiscent of poetry than a philological treatise it deserves to be handled with care.... --Bryn Mawr Classical Review