Sri Aurobindo

Letters on Poetry and Art

SABCL - Volume 27

Part 2. On His Own and Others’ Poetry
Section 3. Practical Guidance for Aspiring Writers
Guidance in Writing Prose

Tragedy in Fiction

I did not like the tragic ending of Jyotirmayi’s story. The conditions of true tragedy are not fulfilled, so far as I can see. Why create sorrow in literature wantonly?

That depends on the work itself. If it involves inevitably a tragic end, that has to be allowed to come. It is only if the tragedy is dragged in unnaturally for the sake of a forceful ending that it is inartistic.

13 January 1936