Transcript Intro to Greek Drama

Introduction to Greek Drama
Greek Landscape and Society: The City-State
Greek City-States
Greek Theater
Theater at Epidaurus
Built at about mid 4th century B.C. (after
the golden age of Athens), it is thought to
be typical of Hellenistic theater
architecture.
This is one of the very few theaters
that retains its original circular
"Orchestra“.
During Roman occupation of Greece,
most theater "Orchestras" were
changed from a circle to a semicircle.
Greek Theater
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Historical Context
 Drama probably has its origins in the chorus, which is Greek for “dance.”
 Thespis reputedly first introduced an actor, separate from the chorus.
 Aeschylus introduced a second actor in the early 5th century BC, and soon
Sophocles added a third. There were never more than three actors
onstage in a Greek play.
Thalia:
the Muse of comedy (the
laughing face)
Melpomene:
the Muse of tragedy (the
weeping face)
The Dionysia
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The earliest dramatists wrote plays for the Athenian Dionysia, a multi-day
spring festival in honor of Dionysus. The Dionysia featured three types of
plays: tragedy, comedy, and the satyr play.
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Dramatists competed to win a prize for the best tragedy. Reportedly, the prize
was originally a goat; the term “tragedy”—in Greek, tragoidia—means “goatsong.”
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A magistrate called the archon chose three tragic playwrights to compete each
year. For the contest, each playwright would compose three tragedies and one
satyr play (a short play of a lighter tone), all of which would have been
performed one after another.
Beginning around 486 BC, comic plays were officially included in the festival—
comedic playwrights offered one play each, which were presented after the
three days of tragedies.
Who were the dramatists?
Tragedy:
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Aeschylus (525-456 B.C.)
--The Oresteia (Agamemnon, The Libation Bearers, The Eumenides)
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Sophocles (496-406 B.C.)
--The Theban Plays (Antigone, Oedipus the King, Oedipus at Colonus)
--Wrote 127 plays, but only 7 survive in complete form
--Won 24 of the 30 Dionysiae he entered
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Euripides (485-406 B.C.)
--Medea
--The Bacchae
Comedy:
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Old Comedy—Aristophanes (450-385 B.C.)
New Comedy—Menander (341-290 B.C.)
Aristotle
(384 BC – 322 BC)
Biographical Information
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Born at Stagira in 384 BC
Studied for 20 years in Athens at the Plato’s Academy, and left when Plato
died in 347 BC.
Studied almost every field of knowledge available to ancient Greeks
Tutored Alexander the Great
Established Lyceum (his school and research institute)
The Text
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Difficult text because it is most probably a series of lectures.
We cannot specifically date The Poetics, but it does appear to be a later work
because it draws on several of his earlier published works, such as Ethics, the
Politics, and Rhetoric.
Aristotle wrote the Poetics about seventy-five years AFTER the last of the
great fifth century tragedies had been written.
His chief aim = to give advice on writing tragedy to contemporary poets.
The Poetics
 Aristotle's Poetics is the earliest work of dramatic theory and marks the
beginning of literary criticism in Western Civilization.
 It sets up principles of poetical and dramatic analysis
 Provides a treatment of poetry like any other discipline and examines its
form and structure with scientific detachment and an objective to
understand how poetry operates and how it achieves its effects.
 The Poetics is in part a response to Plato’s objections to
poetry. Plato had argued that:
1) Poetry is an inspired, and therefore irrational, activity
2) The poet has no knowledge and produces imitations
removed from the reality of Forms
3) Poetry, especially tragedy, is morally harmful; it stimulates
emotions we should suppress.
Plato (left) and Aristotle
(right), by Raphael (Stanza della
Segnatura, Rome)
Reception
Modern scholars have criticized Aristotle’s neglect of the gods in his
treatment of poetry, as well as his neglect of the social and political
implications of drama, tragedy specifically.
However, the Poetics significantly influenced the development of literary
criticism:
• It was only in the Renaissance, when rediscovered by Italian humanists,
that it became a canonical text.
• Renaissance critics tended to read the treatise as a set of rules for
composition.
• Many theories have been ascribed to Aristotle that are not actually in the
text (i.e. the law of the three unities of action, time and place).
• From 16th to the 18th centuries Aristotle’s Poetics dominated literary theory
in Europe, however, with the rise of Romanticism, its influence waned.
Chapter 4: The Origins & Development of Poetry
“The creation of poetry generally is due to two causes,
both rooted in human nature. The instinct for
imitation is inherent in human beings… Also inborn in
all of us is the instinct to enjoy works of imitation.”
(Poetics 60)
“The reason for this is that learning is a very great
pleasure, not only for philosophers, but for other
people as well, though their capacity for it may be
limited. They enjoy seeing images because they learn
as they look at them, and reason out what each thing
is…” (Poetics 60)
Aristotle’s Definition of Tragedy
“Tragedy, then, is a representation of an action that is
serious, complete, and of some magnitude; in language
that is pleasurably embellished, the different forms of
embellishment occurring in separate parts; presented in
the form of action, not narration; by means of pity and
fear bringing about the catharsis of such emotions.”
(Poetics, Chapter 6)
Aristotle, Tragedy, & Comedy
Take 7-10 minutes to speak to your neighbor about the elements
of drama which Aristotle discusses in the Poetics .
1) How does comedy differ from tragedy?
2) List several qualities of good tragedy, along with Chapter
references.
3) What do Aristotle’s Poetics and Horace’s Ars Poetica have in
common?