Of all the major components of a conventional airplane, the tail—empennage, if you prefer—may be the least understood. Yes, we generally know it's there to help balance and stabilize the airplane's attitude in flight, and to help control yaw and pitch, but that's often the extent to which we paid attention in ground school.
This is a companion discussion topic for the original entry at https://www.avweb.com/flight-safety/technique/on-your-tail