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Peripeteia

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Peripeteia (Greek, Περιπέτεια) is a reversal of circumstances, or turning point. The term is primarily used with reference to works of literature. The English form of peripeteia is Peripety. Peripety is a sudden reversal dependent on intellect and logic. In modern Greek περιπέτεια means adventure.

Aristotle defines it as "a change by which the action veers round to its opposite, subject always to our rule of probability or necessity."

Peripeteia includes changes of character, but also more external changes. A character who becomes rich and famous from poverty and obscurity has undergone peripeteia, even if his character remains the same.

When a character learns something he had been previously ignorant of, this is normally distinguished from peripeteia as anagnorisis or discovery, a distinction derived from Aristotle's work.

Aristotle considered anagnorisis, leading to peripeteia, the mark of a superior tragedy. Two such plays are Oedipus the King, where the oracle's information that Oedipus had killed his father and married his mother brought about his mother's death and his own blindness and exile, and Iphigeneia in Tauris, where Iphigenia realizes that the strangers she is to sacrifice are her brother and his friend, resulting in all three of them escaping Tauris. These plots he considered complex and superior to simple plots without anagnorisis or peripeteia, such as when Medea resolves to kill her children, knowing they are her children, and does so. Aristotle identified Oedipus the King, as the principal work demonstrating peripety. (See Aristotle's Poetics.)

Thane Heins' Perepiteia was named after this concept.

Examples

  • In Shakespeare's tragedy Othello, the peripety occurs in the mere middle of the play, act III, scene 3. Othello is slowly deceived by Iago's rhetoric, persuasiveness and imagery, yet in this scene the transition occurs. Iago says 'Indeed' with emphasis, where after Othello replies: "Indeed? Ay, indeed. Discerns't thou aught in that? Is he not honest?". Iago keeps using rhetorical emphasis to corrupt Othello: "Honest, my lord? [...] Think, my lord?". Othello who is of weak character and easily persuaded replies: "Think, my lord! By heaven, he echoes me, / As if there was some monster in his thought / Too hideous to be shown". The corruption continues until the peripety. There are two stanzas indicating this change. Othello has just got married to the beautiful Desdemona, whom he seemed unlikely to marry because he is a Moor (of African descent), nevertheless he has been very lucky. Yet the peripety arrives and Othello exclaims: "Why did I marry? This honest creature [Iago] doubtless / Sees and knows more, much more, than he unfolds". [III, 3, 243-4]. Othello concludes that: "This fellow's of exceeding honesty / And knows all qualities with a learned spirit / Of human dealings" [III, 3, 260]. The peripety has happened and Othello degrades mentally and the transition can be observed in his usage of language. Othello is very eloquent and uses subtle imagery ("Keep up your bright swords, for the dew will rust them" [I, 2, 59]). After the peripety his language degrades to the usage of diabolical and physical imagery. Following the confirmation of his absolute belief in what Iago has told him he remarks: "I had rather be a toad / And live upon the vapour of a dungeon" [III, 3, 272].

  • Alfred Hitchcock is often seen as a modern master of peripety, as seen in his films Rear Window and North by Northwest.

References



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