Reversal, recognition, and suffering

Reversal of situation (peripeteia) is the change by which the action veers round to its opposite, subject always to the rule of probability or necessity. In the Oedipus, the messenger arrives intending to free Oedipus from his fears about his mother — and brings about the opposite result. This is reversal: the direction of the action turns to its contrary at the moment of apparent success.

Recognition (anagnorisis) is the change from ignorance to knowledge — producing either love or hate between persons destined for good or ill fortune. The finest form of recognition, as illustrated by the Oedipus, is that which arises from the incidents themselves and produces its effect through the probable or necessary course of events. When recognition and reversal coincide — when the same event that reveals Oedipus's knowledge is the event that turns his fortune — the plot achieves its maximum effect. The coincidence of the two in a single scene is what Aristotle calls the most powerful form of complex plot construction.

The chapter adds a third element: the scene of suffering (pathos) — a destructive or painful action, such as deaths on stage, torments, wounds, and the like. This is distinct from reversal and recognition; it names the purely affective element of tragedy, the moment of direct pain or destruction, which complements the cognitive elements of the other two.