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Transcript of Greek Theatre. Greek Festivals Festivals honored Olympian gods Ritual Competitions Olympics:...
Greek TheatreGreek Theatre
Greek FestivalsGreek Festivals Festivals honored Olympian gods Ritual Competitions Olympics: Apollo
Athletics Lyric Poetry
Drama: Dionysos Dithyrambic Choruses Tragedy Comedy
Greek TheatreGreek Theatre 6th - 4th century bce Originated in festivals honoring
Dionysos Tragedy:
Aeschylus (524-456 bce) Sophocles (496-406 bce) Euripides (480-406 bce)
Comedy: Old Comedy: bawdy and satiric
Aristophanes (c. 485- c.385 bce) New Comedy: social situations:
Menander (342-292 bce)
Theatre Festivals There were two festivals during which dramatic
productions were staged. The Greater Dionysia took place at the end of
March or the beginning of April Three days were given over to theatrical
competition. Three playwrights each took part in the
contests: Each tragedian put on a trilogy in the morning and each comic writer put on one comedy in the afternoon.
The festival at Lenaes,staged at the end of January or the beginning of February, placed its emphasis on comedy
Theatre at Epidaurus
Curved seats may have aided acoustics.
ACTORS No tragedy used more
than 3 actors All actors were male Costumes included
character masks, and, in later years, raised boots
Acting must have more expressive than realistic
Greek TheatreMasks
THE CHORUS: the voice of the citizens
ORIGINS of TRAGEDY Tragedy, derived from the Greek words tragos (goat) and ode
(song), told a story that was intended to teach religious lessons Arose from dithyrambic choruses: The dithyramb was an ode to
Dionysus. It was usually performed by a chorus of fifty men dressed as satyrs -- mythological half-human, half-goat servants of Dionysus. They played drums, lyres and flutes, and chanted as they danced around a statue of Dionysus.
In the 6th c. bce Thespis of Attica added an actor who interacted with the chorus. This actor was called the protagonist.
In 534 BC, the ruler of Athens, Pisistratus, changed the Dionysian Festivals and instituted drama competitions. Thespis won the first competition in 534 BC.
Tragic Tetralogies Each tragic dramatist had to present
a trilogy of tragedies: connected narratively or dramatically
The entire trilogy was performed in one day.
The trilogy was followed by a satyr play - mocking and lightening the seriousness of the tragedies
A Tetralogy, then, is a series of 4 plays: 3 tragedies and one satyr play
TRAGIC STRUCTURE
4-5 alternating scenes and choral odes, including the
PROLOGOS: Introductory scene PARADOS: Entry of chorus
EPISODEION STASIMON
PAEAN: a hymn of praise to the gods
EXODOS: final scene
EPODE: final ode.
ARISTOTLE’STHREE UNITIES
Aristotle’s On Tragedy is usually considered the first piece of Western dramatic criticism. In it, he proclaimed that tragedy must follow the 3 unities: UNITY OF TIME: one day UNITY OF PLACE: one setting UNITY OF ACTION: one plot
AESCHYLUS 525-456 bce
General in Persian Wars -- fought at Marathon, Salamis, Platea
Fierce proponent of Athenian ideals
The first of the great Athenian dramatists, was also the first to express the agony of the individual caught in conflict.
Credited with adding the second actor
Only extant trilogy: The Oresteia Agamemnon The Libation Bearers The Eumenides
SOPHOCLES 496 - 406
bce Wrote over 100 plays,
but only seven survive Credited with adding the
third actor Known as actor as well
as dramatist Most interested in
human dynamics THEBAN PLAYS:
Oedipus the King Oedipus at Colonnus Antigone
EURIPIDES c.480-406 bce
The last of the three great Greek tragic dramatists -- 17 plays survive
Explored the theme of personal conflict within the polis and the depths of the individual
Disgust with events of Pelopennesian War brought about disillusionment with Athens
Men and women bring disaster on themselves because their passions overwhelm their reason
TRAGIC ACTIONARETE, ARISTEIA: excellence
HUBRIS: arrogance
HAMARTIA: fatal mistake
PERIPETEIA: reversal of fortune
ANAGNORISIS: understanding
KATHARSIS
ORIGINS of OLD COMEDY Arose from komos : songs of revelry,
charms to avert evil, prayers for fertility sung to Dionysus
Chorus dressed ludicrously Audience responded to choral komos
and were gradually admitted into chorus
Chorus became two-part group with antiphonal song
CONVENTIONS of OLD COMEDY
Scene set on Athenian street
“Events seldom occur – they are merely talked about”
Masks and fantastic costumes
Satiric of contemporary events and public figures
Bawdy
COMIC STRUCTURE
Komos: final choral song and exit in wild revelry
4-5 alternating scenes and choral odes
illustrating the outcome of the agon
Prologos: introductory scene
Parados: entry of 24 member chorus dressed in fantastic
costumeAgon: argument “just prior to the agon, the leader of the chorus always asks
one contender to present his argument, and it is this contender who always loses”
Parabasis: chorus’s great song
Episodeion Stasimon
ARISTOPHANESc. 448 - 380 BCE
30+ plays; 11 extant; 6 first prizes
Plays include Clouds Wasps Birds Lysistrata Frogs (Lenaia 405)
Critique of Euripides & Socrates: reactionary conservative; social critic
Plato's epitaph for Aristophanes : “The Graces, seeking a shrine that could not fall, discovered the soul of Aristophanes.”
New Comedy By 317 BC, a new form had evolved that
resembled modern farces: mistaken identities, ironic situations, ordinary characters and wit.
Basic plot: Boy meets girl, complications arise, boy gets girl – ends with betrothal or marriage.
5 act structure: acts divided by interludes performed by the chorus
Stock characters: young lovers, parasite, lecherous old men, clever servants, etc.
Social rather than political satire
MENANDER 342-292 bce
1905 a manuscript was discovered in Cairo that contained pieces of five Menander plays, and in 1957 a complete play, Diskolos (The Grouch, 317 BC), was unearthed in Egypt.
Menander’s comedy with its emphasis on mistaken identity, romance and situational humor, became the model for subsequent comedy, from the Romans to Shakespeare to Broadway.
Parts of Menander’s comedies found their way into plays by
Roman playwrights: Plautus and TerenceShakespeare's Comedy of ErrorsStephen Sondheim's A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum.
The End