The Charm in Tragedies: Why People Enjoy Them

Say you’ve watched a good movie with a tragic ending. Even though it made you sad, you found it enjoyable. Why is that? Tragedies in plays, movies, games etc. have been around for a long time as a form of entertainment. From Shakespeare to NeiR: Automata, tragedies continue to charm people through the ages. And here are the interesting reasons why:

1. Tragedies allow the audience to engage more with the material

Have you ever watched a movie or read a story that made you sad for a while even after you finished it? That’s exactly one of the reasons why tragedies are popular: they remain with you. Stories with happy endings don’t really have this feature. “Happily ever after” is a perfect and ideal close to the story, so there is no more. On the other hand, tragedies don’t end perfectly, and many of them make you think, “What went wrong? What could have been done to prevent this sad ending?”. These thoughts keep you engaged with the material even after you’ve finished it. In other words, it stays with you. It’s an experience that’s deeper than one with happy endings. This is why tragedies remain a popular genre as entertainment, and also why people keep making them.

2. Surprise: Tragedies make you happier

Perhaps you won’t believe me when I say this, but tragedies actually make you happier. It sounds controversial, but tragic stories focus on emotionally negative things, which has the effect of you reflecting on the positive aspects of your own life. Take the Titanic (1997) as an example. The lovers are separated when the ship sinks, and one of them dies. If you’ve never experienced a close one’s death, you focus on the fact that you haven’t experienced a tragedy like theirs so far, and if you have a lover, you focus on the fact that you’re blessed enough to be with them without experiencing a tragic event. Tragedies make you think about your own life, and how you’re life is peaceful and blessed compared to the characters in the story. After all, people wouldn’t need to engage with tragedies if their own life was completely tragic.

3. It helps tell a good story

Finally, the most simple reason of all: Tragedies make a good story. To be a tragedy means it needs to connect and resonate with you to an extent. You have to care enough about the characters to sympathize with them, and for this the story and characters need to be well-rounded. A good tragedy makes you sad like you’re one of the characters in the story. It also makes the story and characters realistic; it shows that not everything in life has a happy ending. It connects with your own life experiences, which makes the story seem more honest and true. A good tragedy equals a good story.

These are the 3 reasons why I think tragedies remain a popular genre today. Of course, when you look closely, there are more than 3 reasons, but these are the main ones. The charm in tragedies is deeper than it looks at first glance; so how about watching or reading a tragedy and confirming whether these reasons also are true for you?