![]() ![]() Diana, the woodland goddess, transforms Actaeon into a deer and thus he is hunted down and destroyed by his own vicious hounds. The ancient story of the hunter Actaeon shows us this connection between recognition and reversal. The second component of tragedy is "reversal" where through some form of inquiry or journey, the hero discovers that recognition is held in a kind of 180 degree turn where formerly held truths are actually versions of ignorance or that former versions of ignorance turn out to be visionary. Let me remind you that Homer is undoubtedly a tradition-evolving out of three ages of oral culture-rather than a single human being. In Greek sculpture, a few statues have somewhat featureless eyes, perhaps suggesting the idea of the blind seer again and of course ancient rumors reported that Homer-in all his visionary poetry-was also blind. ![]() In Greek culture blindness and seeing are transposed to indicate this moment of recognition as tragic vision recognition manifests itself in blind prophets like Tiresias the seer and Oedipus' act of blinding himself (after seeking out the reality of his life). The first is "recognition" which implies the realization of some truth, that often times (initially) appears to the protagonist as a form of ignorance. ![]() ![]() The three components work in relationship with each other, a collaboration leading to higher consciousness and restored order, whether socially or individually defined. In the Poetics, Aristotle describes three essential parts to Greek Tragedy and in turn successful art. ![]()
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