Transcript Lecture 7 Greek Theatre 1_BEL_20161219114203x

Backgrounds to English
Literature
Lecture 6: Homer
=Origin of the Greek theatre: the Festival of Dionysus
-The modern word “drama” comes from the Greek word dran
meaning “to do”
-The modern word “theater” comes from the Greek word theatron
meaning “seeing place”
-The theatre was part of a religious festival: act of worship,
entertainment or intellectual pastime.
-The god celebrated by the performances of the plays was Dionysus
-The earliest origins of drama are ancient hymns, called dithyrambs.
These were sung in honor of the god Dionysus. These hymns were
later adapted for choral processions in which participants would dress
up in costumes and masks.
-Dithyrambs: a poem, chant, or hymn of ancient Greece sung by
revelers at the festival in honor of the god Dionysus
=The “City Dionysia”
-It was the second-most important festival after the Panathenaia (the
religious festival in honor of Athena).
-In the sixth century BC, the Athenian ruler, Pisistratus, established
the 'City Dionysia'.
-A religious festival held in honor of the god Dionysus.
-It comprised two related festivals, the Rural Dionysia and the City
Dionysia. The City Dionysia was held about three months after the
rural Dionysia.
-This festival featured competitions in music, singing, dance and
poetry.
-Playwrights presented tragedies and comedies during the three days
of this festival. The archon, a state official, selected three poets to
compete for the prizes in the tragedy division. Tragedies were
presented in trilogies. Interspersed between the three plays in the
trilogy were satyr plays, in which satyrs (men dressed as half-goats)
made fun of the characters in the surrounding tragedies.
-The choregus, a wealthy, prominent citizen of Athens, was required
by law to pay for the cost of training and costumes for the chorus.
-A jury of 10 citizens selected the winning poet, awarding prizes to
the best plays each year. Sophocles, one of the most well-known
Greek playwrights, won 24 of these contests.
-The most remarkable of all the winners was said to be a wandering
bard named Thespis.
=Why did the Greeks celebrate the god Dionysus?
-According to tradition the festival was established after Eleutherae,
a town on the border between Attica and Boeotia, chose to become
part of Attica. The Eleuthereans brought a statue of Dionysus to
Athens, which was initially rejected by the Athenians. Dionysus then
punished the Athenians with a plague affecting the male genitalia that
was cured when the Athenians accepted the cult of Dionysus. This
was recalled each year by a procession of citizens carrying phalloi.
-In Greek Mythology Dionysus was the son of Zeus. He is the only
god born of one god and one mortal parent. He was the god of wine,
fertility, revelry, and art.
-The Apollonian (reason and rational) and the Dionysian (irrational
and chaos)
=Theatre
-The theater in which ancient Greek plays were performed was an
outdoor, open-air complex with seats arranged around the center
stage in tiers.
-Theatre of Dionysus: The first plays were performed in the Theatre
of Dionysus, the first permanent theatre structure, built in the
shadow of the Acropolis in Athens at the beginning of the 5th century
B.C. These theatres proved to be so popular they soon spread all
over Greece.
-Orchestra: (literally, “dancing space”) A circular and level space
where the chorus would dance, sing, and interact with the actors who
were on the stage near the skene.
-Theatron: (literally, “viewing-place”) This is where the spectators
sat. The theatron was usually part of hillside overlooking the
orchestra.
-Skene: (literally, “tent”) The skene was directly in back of the stage,
and was usually decorated as a palace, temple, or other building,
depending on the needs of the play. It had at least one set of doors,
and actors could make entrances and exits through them.
-Parodos: (literally, “passageways”) The paths by which the chorus
and some actors made their entrances and exits. The audience also
used them to enter and exit the theater before and after the
performance.
-Deus ex machina (meaning: “god from the machine”): a device used
like a crane to lift actors so they appeared to be floating in mid-air.
In some plays this device was used for actors portraying gods.
-Eccylema: a large platform on wheels that could be rolled in to show
the aftermath of a scene not acted out in front of the audience
=Chorus
-Greek theatre had its beginnings with Dithyrambs, in which choral
groups composed of 50 men and boys would sing or chant in unison.
These groups told stories written by playwrights.
-Functions of the Chorus
Add the beauty of song and dance.
Set the mood or express the main themes of the play by commenting
on the action.
Create a bridge between the actors and the audience.
Converse with and give advice to the actors.
Providing lessons in morality as well as entertainment.
Tell about events that have already happened in the past.
Foretell the future by interpreting the actions of the actors.
=Actors and Mask
-By the 5th century, BC, a man named Thespis of Attica “invented”
acting by designating one member of the chorus to stand out from the
chorus and respond to them. This is why actors are often called
Thespians. After Thespis, playwrights continued to be the only actor
separate from the chorus in their plays.
-Aeschylus, known for "Persians," first performed in 472 B.C., began
using two actors in his plays.
-Sophocles became the first playwright to hire professional actors
rather than playing a role himself. He added a third actor and scenery.
-The Greek name for an actor was “hypocrite.”
-All actors were men, because it was considered undignified for
women to appear on stage
-As there were only 3 actors, they wore masks to play multiple parts.
-The masks were worn for many reason including:
1. Visibility
2. Acoustic Assistance
3. Few Actors, Many Roles
4. Characterization: old man, young man, slave, woman, special masks
(mourning, blindness, deceit, drunkenness, etc.)
=The functions of the theatre and the drama in the Ancient Greek
-Graphic performance of the Athenian democracy’s civic ideology:
the onstage parade of war-orphans in hoplite armour provided by the
state the proclamation of citizens whose benefactions to the city had
been voted the award of a crown (a citizen’s self-sacrifice – the
donation of one’s life or one’s money to the city +state-sponsored
recognition and compensation)
-An arena for conspicuous and highly competitive euergetism
(practice of the elite- public benefaction) before the masses: the
Dionysia’s funding and seating arrangements
-The playwright served as a sort of teacher, offering plays for the
ethical and moral improvement of his fellow citizens to insure the
spiritual survival of the community.
=Comedy
-Comedy was not admitted to Dionysus festival till 487-486 B.C.
-The first comedies were mainly satirical and mocked men in power
for their vanity and foolishness: Exaggerated, farcical, sensual
pleasures
-The first master of comedy was the playwright Aristophanes
(LYSISTRATA).
=Satyr Plays
-The satyrs were mythical half-human, half-goat servants of
Dionysus.
-Short plays performed between the acts of tragedies. They made
fun of the plight of the tragedy's characters.
-The Satyr and the Satyr plays spawned the modern word satire.
=Tragedy
-The term, tragedy, from the Greek tragos (goat) and ode (poem):
tragedy = goat song or goat poem.
-A serious drama with a protagonist who struggles to achieve one
thing and is ultimately unable to attain it, failing deeply.
-Tragic Hero:
Aristotle studied the plays of his time and noticed a trend in the main
characters. He coined the phrase tragic hero.
A tragic hero: larger than life / rise to good fortune and then fall to
death or defeat / falls because of a flaw in his/her character known as
a tragic flaw (hamartia).
-Tragic Flaw: a weakness that the protagonist has, leading to his or
her downfall; Hamartia meaning “to miss the mark”
-A tragic hero inspires pity and fear in his/her audience (catharsis)
-Why tragedy?:
The Greek believed that man was subject to the whims of the gods
and fate.
The Greeks believed that everything happened for a reason and that
the path they led in life, was prescribed for them by the Gods and
that there was no escaping their fate or destiny.
Man cannot avoid suffering.
In nearly all tragedies, man’s biggest fault is excessive pride – a
mistaken belief that he could somehow avoid fate or the will of the
gods.
=Aeschylus (525-456 BC)
-Often called the Father of Tragedy
-Known for his Orestia trilogy: Agamemnon, The Libation Bearers,
The Eumenides
=Euripedes (480-406 BC)
-Youngest, most modern, and least popular of the three great writers
of tragedy.
-Emphasized psychological motivation and social consciousness
-Works: Medea, Hippolytus, Electra, The Trojan Women, Bacchae
=Sophocles: (496-406 B.C.)
-The son of a wealthy merchant, he would enjoy all the comforts of a
thriving Greek empire. By the age of sixteen, he was chosen to lead a
choir of boys at a celebration of the victory of Salamis. By age 28 his
studies complete, and he was ready to compete in the City Dionysia.
-He won 24 contests, never lower than 2nd;
-Sophocles expanded the format of drama
He added a third actor.
He increased the amount of dialogue within a play.
He decreased the importance of the chorus by fixing its number at 15.
He invented painted scenery and added flute music in the background
of his plays.
He made each play of a trilogy stand by itself as a separate story.
-Works: Ajax , Antigone, Oedipus the King, Trachiniae, Electra,
Philoctetes and Oedipus at Colonus.
=The Final Curtain
-By the time of Sophocles' death in 406 BC (128 years after Thespis'
victory in the first Athenian drama competition) the golden era of
Greek drama was ending. Athens, whose free-thinking culture had
spawned the birth of theater, would be overrun in 404 BC by the
Spartans, and would later be torn apart by constant warring with
other city states, eventually falling under the dominion of Alexander
the Great and his Macedonian armies. Theater continued, but it would
not return to the same creative heights until Elizabethan England two
millenia later.
=Theban plays or The Oedipus Cycle
-Sophocles wrote three plays, a trilogy, that centered around the
royal house of Thebes (Oedipus the King, Oedipus at Colonus, and
Antigone).
-Antigone, the third play in the series was actually written first, then
Oedipus the King, and finally Oedipus at Colonus .
-The three plays are linked together by specific characters but the
themes and issues are drastically different in each.
-Oedipus the King (Oedipus Rex) tells of how Oedipus discovered
how he had fallen into horrible crimes just as he tried to avoid them;
-Oedipus at Colonus tells how he died in exile;
-Antigone tells how his daughter and most of his family are destroyed
in the aftermath of still more family crimes.
=The Founding of Thebes
-Thebes is one of the oldest cities of Greece, site of a vast
Mycenaean palace, and powerful well into the Classical period.
-In Greek drama, Thebes appears as a strange, dangerous city where
anything can happen: Dragon-born warriors, Maenads, Man-eating
sphinxes, Incestuous marriages
-Thebes’ foundation begins with the story of Europa and the Bull.
-Zeus was attracted to Europa, a young girl from Tyre in Asia Minor.
He appeared to her as a bull. When she got on his back, he took her
across the sea to Crete.
-Her brother Cadmus went looking for her. He consulted Apollo at
Delphi. Apollo told him to forget Europa, and follow a certain cow.
Cadmus followed the cow till it stopped, then prepared to sacrifice it.
When his men went to get water from a nearby spring, they were
killed by the serpent who guarded it. Cadmus killed the serpent.
Cadmus sowed the serpent’s teeth to grow new warrior companions.
They killed each other, leaving five who became the founders of
Thebes’ main families.
-Then Cadmus had to serve Ares, the serpent’s master, for a year.
Afterwards he married Harmonia, daughter of Ares and Aphrodite.
Among their descendants: Semele, Dionysus, & Pentheus. They ruled
for a long time and were finally transformed into serpents – a
connection of Thebes and chthonic powers.
-Four generations later came Oedipus.
Group discussion
=Carl Jung’s Archetypes and Collective Unconscious
-The psychologist Carl Jung proposed that in addition to our
individual unconscious minds, there is a “collective unconscious,” an
underpinning of ideas and images we share by virtue of sharing the
human experience.
-Archetypes are images, story patterns, and connections that reflect
the collective unconscious. Consequently they show up in many
variants, all over the world.
=Question: Please identify one archetype from collective unconscious
of your own country or the world, and explain it to your friends.