Analysis of The Poetics - Chapter 7

Tragedy is the imitation of an action that is complete and whole in itself and of a certain magnitude. By whole it is meant that the fable (plot) of the tragedy must have a beginning, a middle and an end. The beginning should be such, that it should not be followed by any events but there should be certain events after it owing to the consequences of the beginning. On the contrary, an end should be such that there should not be any events after it but the end should itself be a result of certain consequences. The middle is that part of the play which is a result of certain consequences of the past events and there are also certain events after it. Thus the beginning, the middle and the end should be presented in a proper manner and not haphazardly.
The proper length of the play is extremely important. It should neither be too short nor too long. If a person sees a beautiful thing which is extremely small in size, it would become difficult for him to admire it properly. The reason is that the person would not able to perceive it’s beauty owing to its small size. Similarly a very large sized thing is also impossible to admire because the person cannot see it as a single whole. This could be something as big as about a thousand miles. Thus the object must be of a proper size in order to be admirable. Just like a living body or organism should be of such a size that it can be enjoyed without any problem, Similarly the length of a play should be such that it can be retained in the memory without any problem. There is no hard and fast rule for the actual length of a tragedy. If there were a hundred tragedies performed in a dramatic contest then their length would be regulated by a water clock as is the case with certain other events. To define the appropriate length of the play, it can be said that it must be long enough so as to allow the change from happiness to misery or from misery to happiness depending upon the theme of the play.