Definitions

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun Recognition.
  • noun The unraveling of a plot in dramatic action; dénouement; clearing up.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun rare The unfolding or dénouement.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun The moment in the plot of a drama in which the hero makes a discovery that explains previously unexplained events or situations.

Etymologies

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Examples

  • Because the upside of being a tragic protagonist is that every such protagonist experiences anagnorisis, meaning “recognition.”

    Amaryllis in Blueberry Christina Meldrum 2011

  • Like you might read a Greek play and initially identify the basic agon and the key moment of anagnorisis, you might read an SF short story and initially identify the most obvious alethic quirks.

    Modality and Hamlet Hal Duncan 2010

  • Because the upside of being a tragic protagonist is that every such protagonist experiences anagnorisis, meaning “recognition.”

    Amaryllis in Blueberry Christina Meldrum 2011

  • Because the upside of being a tragic protagonist is that every such protagonist experiences anagnorisis, meaning “recognition.”

    Amaryllis in Blueberry Christina Meldrum 2011

  • His anagnorisis -- when the protagonist realizes the true identities of those surrounding him along with his own -- took place in the solitary cell of Evin prison where he spent twenty days.

    Mir-Sayafi: Iranian Blogger's Writings Bring Him To Life 2010

  • His anagnorisis -- when the protagonist realizes the true identities of those surrounding him along with his own -- took place in the solitary cell of Evin prison where he spent twenty days.

    Mir-Sayafi: Iranian Blogger's Writings Bring Him To Life 2010

  • If I recall correctly, anagnorisis was in Aristotle's Poetics the "recognition" of a tragic hero that leads to his downfall, the classic example being Oedipus's recognition that he married his mother.

    Creatures of the interlude 2009

  • His anagnorisis--when the protagonist realizes the true identities of those surrounding him along with his own--took place in the solitary cell of Evin prison where he spent twenty days.

    Mir-Sayafi: Iranian Blogger's Writings Bring Him To Life The Huffington Post News Team 2009

  • The author thus depicted suffered an attack of anagnorisis at least twice while reading it.

    SF Tidbits for 10/7/07 2007

  • Structurally, TWBB is the first half of a Greek tragedy, perhaps, although the anagnorisis and catastrophe and what a catastrophe both storm in by the last twenty minutes.

    Kenneth Hite's Journal princeofcairo 2008

Comments

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  • What a wonderful word. Taught to me by my Shakespeare professor.

    October 1, 2008

  • Refers to an unveiling of truths. Great word. I always picture Poirot pacing around the drawing room with a crimson carpet, velvety curtains drawn, as nervous enemies sit on edge.

    October 20, 2009

  • "He realizes everything at once like the climax of a bad Hindi musical. And then, with a certain horrid glee, he gets to the fundamental truth of it, the anagnorisis: This incident alone will keep us two old boys going for the next forty years. It is the story to end all stories. It is the gift that keeps on giving."

    White Teeth by Zadie Smith, p 441 of the Vintage International paperback

    February 1, 2011

  • See comments on eudaimonia.

    October 6, 2011

  • By charm he stole a few kisses -
    No harm if kept hid from the Mrs. -
    But if he's espied
    Then woe him betide!
    He'll burn in her anagnorisis.

    January 9, 2015

  • "I have just been talking with Father Putnam," she began in the coldest, most serious voice I think I had ever heard her use. "He has told me awful things—"

    Waves of reaction crashed into my brain with howling sounds. I was desperately attempting to gain a purchase as the ground shifted, swayed, opened under me. Aristotle defined that moment in tragedy when the character realizes everything as anagnorisis. The moment, for instance, when Oedipus realizes that he is not the successful king of Thebes so much as he is the murder of his father and the bed partner of his mother, the taboo created by a destiny that mocked his pathetic attempts to escape his fater. This was that moment for me.

    Charles Rowan Beye, My Husband and My Wives: A Gay Man's Odyssey (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2012), p. 49

    March 6, 2016