Star Wars: a Shakespearean tragedy in six parts  By Joseph
Barber  The Star Wars series paints a fairly sad picture. A man
driven to madness by the death of his family seeks out and
systematically destroys everything he loved, leading to his
death as he sacrifices himself to kill his cruel mentor.  This
is because the story is not Luke's, but Anakin's; it is about
his eventual transformation into the monster Darth Vader, and
his eventual redemption through death.  One of the defining
elements of a Shakespearean tragedy is that everyone dies in the
end. This is almost true from Anakin's perspective, as the only
living remnant of his old society is his son, whom he has
recently tried to kill, and his daughter, whom he has never met.
In some ways the end of the old Jedi order can be compared to
the end of chivalry in the Middle Ages, brought on by the advent
of new technology like crossbows and guns. This is best seen in
Return of the Jedi, when it is not a knight's sword (a
lightsaber) that slays the dragon (t