ARISTOTLE'S - PLOT VERSUS CHARACTER

 Aristotle holds the plot to be the most important constituent while character'maintains the second place. By plot be means the structure of incidents or the action that is imitated. He defines tragedy highlighting the significance of the plot. Tragedy is an imitation not of men but of an action of life. Action in Aristotle is not purely external act, but an inward process, a man's rational personality. He agrees that "it is their characters indeed that make men what they are, but it is by reason of their action that they are huppy or otherwise".

 "Happiness or unhappiness is boud up with action not with character". There could not be tragedy without action but there could be one withour character". In the drama the characters are not described, they enact their own story and so reveal themelves. To be deamatic action'is thus an absolute must. The plot, then, is the life blood of the sction. [t emb.races not only ihe deeds, the incidents and situations but also the mental processes€nd motives which underlie the outward events which result from thiiii, _ __- r:,::{--.-, .. ._ Characterconsists of two elements;-Ethos is the moral element in character. It reveals a certain state or direction of will. It is an expression of moral purpose, of the permanent disposition an dtendencies, the tore and sentiment of the individual.

 Dianoeia is the intellectual element which is implied in all rational conduct through which alone ethos can find outward expression. It is separable from ethos only by a process of arbitration. The most important of all the elements of tragedy is the plot or the arrangement of incidents. "Tragedy is an imitation not of men. But of an action and of life, and life consists in action. aristotle says: "Without action there cannot be atragedy; there may be without character". The plot is the first principle and as it were, the soul of tragedy. 

A character by himself cannot produce atragedy. Dramatic action is not aimed at the representation of character Character comes in asa subsidiary to the action. The plot contains the Kernel or the nucleus of that action which is the chief end of tragedy to represent. Plot and character grow harder to separate as the plot takes place more and more inside the character, pnd the crisis of the drama withdraws into the theatre of the soull