The Tragedy Of Human Beings

The Glass Menagerie, written by Tennessee Williams in 1944, is a little pathetic play about a family on the edge of falling apart. In the play, each character is bathed in the pale glow of aching illusions. When reality frustrates their illusions, they will be lost in their predicaments, which causes great sufferings to them. Such dramatic tragedy as The Glass Menagerie is to explore the existential conditions of the characters, which is a reflection of human existential conditions. This is the essence and purpose of tragedy.In ancient times, tragedy was not merely a form of literary art, but a true expression of human existential conditions. This role is still present today in our contemporary drama. But up till now, few studies have explored the play The Glass Menagerie as a fully developed tragedy. Using tragic theories at home and abroad and other relevant philosophical thoughts as guides, this paper attempts to trace the tragic life of the Wingfields via scrutiny of the play The Glass Menagerie so as to understand and define tragedy from a new perspective, which is based on the striking contrast between ideals and reality presented in Thomas More's Utopia. And based on this understanding, this paper analyzes the existential crises of the Wingfields and tries to prove that The Glass Menagerie is not only a tragedy of the family but also a tragedy of human beings in their predicaments.This paper begins with an introduction to the existential predicaments of the author's family during the Great Depression, presents a detailed literary review and gives the general aims of this paper. The Glass Menagerie is an autobiographical play. It transforms the Williams family of St. Louis into a shabby St. Louis tenement apartment occupied by Amanda Wingfield and her two adult children Laura and Tom and all the characters in the play have their real counterparts. Meanwhile, because of the influence of Anton Chekhov, Williams pays more attention to human conditions in his writings. Thus, The Glass Menagerie is more than a family life; it is a reappearance of the tragic life of American people in Williams' time and place. Although the play ends without violence, it is a tragedy. As Hegel puts it, " A personal tragedy, behind which there is no reflection of the tragedy of human beings, will be meaningless." Therefore, the tragedy of the Wingfields is not only an American tragedy but also a tragedy of human beings.In the second part, this paper concentrates on western tragic theories by some philosophers such as Aristotle, Hegel, Nietzsche and Paul Gordon, especially in the search for definitions of tragedy. It is Aristotle who first strove to define tragedy and all subsequent discussions of tragic forms have been influenced by his concepts. However, Aristotle's tragic theories are limited to certain Greek tragedies and cannot be used to apply to all tragedies past and present. After Aristotle, some famous thinkers have explored new forms and new meanings of tragedy, such as, Hegel, Nietzsche, and Paul Gordon. Their views on tragedy are helpful in enlightening me on considering the tension between ideals and reality as the final causative force of suffering in defining tragedy. In particular, Mr. Ren Shengming's exploration of the relationship between tragedy and human existential predicaments in the book A Study of Modern Tragedy of the West provides me with a new perspective in understanding tragedy.Human existence is a process of man's continuously pursuing ideals. However, ideals cannot usually be completely identical with reality. Just as in Thomas More's Utopia, there is a contrast between ideals and reality. When what a person wishes or expects is frustrated by reality, he\she will be put into predicament and great sufferings will follow. True depth of tragedy will become apparent when human ideals come into conflict with harsh reality. Thus, I define tragedy like this:Tragedy is a dramatic form with pains or sufferings caused by the tension between ideals and reality, which stimulates a response of a...