Talk:Tragedy (event)

this is a compilation of guesses

this page seems to be a compilation of assumptions or inferences of the meaning of tragedy; examples that seem correct do not express where the tragedy actually lay, while other examples seem drawn from less specific usage in the media (although there may be something to the idea that any usage of the term 'tragedy' in the media to describe [or prescribe] a story of suffering then qualifies itself to be so, regardless of the particular circumstances)

here's an excerpt of something i was writing on another discussion page -

"...but i would say that the definitions of tragic and tragedy both on wiki (certainly the disambiguation page - "A tragedy is a literary work with an unhappy outcome") and the wider web fall short of the specific dramatic and general adjectival definitions i was taught in school - in general use, if something is tragic then it happened to someone as a result of something they (or an associated party) did, especially if that thing was something they (or the associated party) should have known not to do or could have prevented. eg your roof suddenly collapses and kills you - bummer, but an accident, not a tragedy; you think your ceiling is unstable so you poke it with a broom handle, and then it collapses on you - tragic."

even if you don't agree with that general description (it is simplistic but not necessarily bastardized), you must agree that such usage of the term is derived from the dramatic idea of tragedy, which could perhaps be seen (if not said) to be an ironic link between cause and disastrous effect, and distinct from a 'sad' story, or a story in which the characters suffer for non-ironic reasons. on that basis, one could only conclude that a tragedy has occurred if one is aware of a 'tragic' background surrounding the events (eg in the case of sept11, that the US was somehow unwittingly responsible, etc); but to say that an event is tragic but to not say precisely why, in the dramatic sense or otherwise, would be akin to saying that something is really funny but not going on to give an idea of the punchline. Here i refer to the line referenced from the book on "disaster workers" (not the tragedy response group) [ref1 atm] "Not all death is considered to be a tragedy...rather it is a precise set of symptoms surrouding[sic] the loss that define it as such. There are a variety of factors that define a death as tragic." In other words, much of what is on this page could also feature on the terrific or terrible (event) page, or the Disaster and/or Catastrophe page, but I think some of the examples and definitions here, such as "an event in which one or more losses, usually of human life, occurs that is viewed as mournful... is said to be tragic", are perhaps too vague for the tragedy (event) page. If the page exists to give context for the word when it is used without it, then it should be as precise as possible, and my hope is that someone better (than me) at writing reference/explaining tragedy will go on to do that. (preferably elsewhere, after dealing with this article) [see also Irony, hubris, hamartia, tragedy(a history of theatre known as tragedy)]

furthermore, i call into question the quality of most of the references cited, generally and/or specifically in regard to my assumptions regarding their qualification to define anything at all.

in closing, this page should be removed or severely reduced on the basis that where it is not vague it just plain wrong or made-up, and so is in fact counter-productive to an understanding of the concept of tragedy. a simple reparation would be to revise/add a more specific adjectival definition to the overview aka lead section of this tragedy page, as it is not what i would call immediately discernible therein, eg based on the first line you may think tragedy is any drama that evokes 'schadenfreude', and if that's true then you could probably shorten the rest of that page a fair bit. (while yr there, remove the line 'For the loss of life see tragedy (event)', or replace it with 'To see how loss of life can be tragic, scroll down'). [off topic i guess.] 203.206.42.213 (talk) 07:12, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

Classically, a tragedy is a story whose protagonist is ruined by his own flaws. Nowadays the word (noun or adjective) is applied to anything Really Really Sad. Personally I reserve it for misfortunes that result from human error. A car hits a patch of ice in the dark and the driver dies, or a pervert kills twenty children: that's sad but it's not tragedy; there's no moral lesson in it. I knew someone who was too depressed to bother trying not to let diabetes kill him: that's tragedy, imho.

The usages of a word are generally not appropriate material for an encyclopedia article. Maybe I'll start the deletion process. —Tamfang (talk) 01:28, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

Stalin

Why is there a Stalin quote? Why not put his quote in context, ie: Stalin killed around 20 million people. Jvarkias (talk) 19:34, 20 July 2012 (UTC)

It was delted since, probably because it is missatributed. It probably orginates from Kurt Tucholsky, who quoted "a Quai d'Orsay diplomat" see [1]. --MrBurns (talk) 22:38, 12 June 2022 (UTC)