Tragic. Comic.

Ben is a tall, slightly too serious, but good looking enough that we can forgive that, young man. He found out that Alice (sensible glasses, always well turned out but with endearingly worn-down shoes) was interested in him. And, even though he hadn't been interested in Alice before, this knowledge made her much more attractive and he fell for her in a big way. Unfortunately, Alice was not really interested in Ben - she had just put that idea about in order to pique the interest of Tom (dark, dashing, dangerous).

Ben could not get over Alice and ended up moving to Canada in an effort to forget her. He had a series of relationships that were always overshadowed by thoughts of Alice and, eventually, he gave up on women altogether and tried, unsuccessfully, to lose himself in his work.

Nelson is a short, red-faced man with a permanently flustered and slightly self-important air. He looks as though he might suffer from body odour even though he actually smells of Imperial Leather soap. Nelson came across a note from Amanda (tall, green-eyed, striking) and, somehow, arrived at the conclusion that she was head-over-heels in love with him. In fact, and unbeknown to Alice, Amanda was engaged to dark, dashing, dangerous Tom. Nelson persisted in his delusion for quite a while, despite the fact that the real state of affairs was perfectly clear to everyone else. Eventually, after a series of hints had been dropped from increasingly great heights, the penny also dropped (from a not-very-great height - Nelson's nickname was, for a combination of reasons, Napoleon) and Nelson, after unconvincingly claiming that he had never been interested in Amanda in the first place, moved to Surrey where he took solace in his hobby of collecting aeroplane registrations.

And Alice? She married a man who was remarkably similar to Ben. They have three children.

The difference between tragedy and comedy is purely a matter of empathy.