Greek Theaterc. 550-220 B.C.E.

DionysusGod of wine, agriculture, and fertility of

nature

Theater of Dionysus, Athensbase of the Acropolis

Reconstruction drawings

Epidauros

Greek Theater Greek theater was directed at the moral and political education of

the community The poet’s role was the improvement of the polis (city-state) Plays tend to reflect five specific thematic ideas:

Reverence: learning to respect something other than one’s own desires and needs

Self-knowledge: never claiming ignorance as an excuse for one’s actions Balance: avoiding excessive behavior Forethought: making decisions after first considering their

consequences Irony of fate: man’s limited power contrasted with the gods’

omnipotence

Balance through Contrapposto

Structure of Plays Prologue: speech or scene that preceded the entrance of the

chorus Parodos: entrance song of the chorus sung as they entered the

orchestra Episodes: scenes in which the actors took the main roles Stasimon/a: the subsequent choral odes, sung and danced by the

chorus, which usually alternated with the episodes. These odes were usually structured in alternating, metrically identical stanzas, called strophe (“turn”) and antistrophe (“counterturn”). If there was a metrically different free-standing stanza following the strophe and antistrophe, this was called an epode.

Exodos: song sung by the chorus as they left the orchestra, concluding the play

Tragedy

“Definition” A drama of a serious and dignified character

that typically describes the development of a conflict between the protagonist and a superior force (such as destiny, circumstance, or society) and reaches a sorrowful or disastrous conclusion.

Terms Hamartia: some error or frailty / act of injustice Tragic flaw: an excess of some character trait that leads to disaster Hubris: overweening pride (presumption suggesting impious

disregard of the limits governing human action in an orderly universe)

Catharsis: the purging and illuminating that tragedy effects through pity and fear

Peripeteia: reversal, point when the hero’s fortunes turn in an unexpected direction

Anagnorisis: recognition Dramatic irony: the meaning of a character’s words or actions is

understood by the audience but not by the character

Some Characteristics of Tragedy Materials drawn from familiar myths Major events happen offstage,

reported/commented Setting in dynastic house Images of rock, net, house in disorder Deplores hubris

The Tragic Hero… is king or person in position of high leadership is of noble stature is good, but not perfect is prompted by will or circumstance, fatal ignorance, or

binding obligation commits “an act of injustice” / possesses a tragic flaw

(harmartia) is responsible for his own downfall (tragic vs. pathetic) ’s punishment exceeds the crime falls, suffers, and dies/meets an unhappy outcome gains self-knowledge

The Silver Lining Outcome is death Tragedy affirms life in this world Tragedy ends in optimism Tragedy is paradoxical Catharsis

The Vision of Tragedy The highest comedy gains its power from its

sense of tragic possibility the profoundest tragedy presents a full if

fleeting vision, through the temporary disorder, of an ordered universe to which comedy is witness

without a sense of the tragic, comedy loses heart; it becomes brittle, it has animation but no life

without the recognition of the truths of comedy, tragedy becomes bleak and intolerable

Aristotle’s Poetics Tragedy as mimesis

Tragedy as distinct from history Six elements of tragedy (in order of

importance): Plot Character Diction Thought Spectacle Song

Structure of Plays

from Paul Roche’s introduction to Oedipus

“It is true that the downfall of the house of Oedipus was foretold by the gods even before Oedipus was born, but it was foretold because it was going to happen; it was not going to happen because it was foretold.”

“ . . . the tragedy was that having murdered his father and married his mother he made the fully responsible mistake of finding it out. As he was an upright man, but proud, the gods allowed him to make the first mistake; as he was a headstrong man, but overweening in self-confidence, he allowed himself to make the second. Zeal mysteriously worked with destiny to trip him up on his self-righteousness and then reveal an arrogance which pressed forward to calamity.”