Dramatic Festivals Research Articles

The Ideology of Democratic Athens: Institutions, Orators and the Mythical Past by Matteo Barbato

Reviewed by: The Ideology of Democratic Athens: Institutions, Orators and the Mythical Past by Matteo Barbato Christine Plastow (bio) Matteo Barbato, The Ideology of Democratic Athens: Institutions, Orators and the Mythical Past. Edinburgh, GB: Edinburgh University Press, 2020. 252 pp. ISBN: 978-1-4744-6642-4. Barbato's book offers a new analysis of Athenian ideology through the application of a New Institutionalist approach to the city's democratic institutions as demonstrated by their use of stories from the mythical past. He argues for a middle ground between Marxist and culturalist understandings, characterising Athenian ideology as value-neutral, flexible, normative, constructive, and bidirectional. This is illustrated through an analysis of the varied presentations of four myths across several institutional contexts: particularly the epitaphioi logoi, but also tragedy, Assembly and forensic speeches, and private genres. An introduction lays out the structure of the book and summarises previous approaches to Athenian ideology; there is a particular focus on the Marxist approach of Nicole Loraux and others, and the culturalist approach illustrated by the work of Josiah Ober. The second chapter explores Athenian knowledge of mythology, identifying the theatre as its main source but also noting the importance of religious festivals such as the Panathenaia, public institutional contexts, and private learning. The third chapter establishes Barbato's theoretical approach, drawing on New Institutionalism to argue that the different democratic institutions of Athens had their own discursive frameworks and that discourse within them was necessarily structured by these: the need to create an imagined community in the funeral speeches; the requirement to argue in favour of justice in the law courts; the principle of advantage for the Athenians in the Assembly, and both justice and advantage in the Council; and the ability to play with the ideological frameworks of other institutions and the need to appeal to a diverse audience at the dramatic festivals. The subsequent four chapters examine the use of four stories from the Athenian mythic past in these institutional contexts and in private genres: the concept of Athenian autochthony, the sheltering of the Heraclidae, the Amazonomachy, and the assistance provided to Adrastus against Thebes. A short conclusion summarises the book's arguments and contextualises its contributions to the study of Athenian ideology, democracy more broadly, and interactions between Classics and political science. [End Page 88] There is much to commend Barbato's book. His analysis of Athenian ideology highlights two important points that are not prominent in the work on the subject to date. First, he emphasises that Athenian ideology was not fixed but fluid and dynamic, and that the presentation of ideological material necessarily differed based on the context in which it was delivered. This is an important point to grasp to understand the Athenians' apparent tendency to contradict themselves from source to source. Barbato successfully illustrates the appropriateness of different perspectives in different institutional contexts. For example, his nuanced analysis of the various versions of the myth of Adrastus presented in Lysias' funeral oration, Euripides' Suppliant Women, and Assembly speeches convincingly shows how the emphasis on or exclusion of certain narrative features—such as the hybris of the Thebans—can be manipulated to evoke aspects of the democratic ideology suitable to the setting. Second, he is right to draw attention to the fact that ideological material not only describes the audience's viewpoint but also moulds it by demonstrating a norm to which they are expected to conform, touching implicitly on an important point regarding the cognitive effects of rhetoric. Indeed, this methodology in combination with a cognitive approach could produce a particularly strong reading: for instance, how was the ideological result affected by the movement of audience members between the institutions and their memory of the different versions they had heard in other arenas? Barbato is working within a particular school of thought in the study of Athenian oratory that proposes that strict expectations of acceptability were in place in the various contexts of public speaking. Indeed, in his conclusion he summarises that the institutionalist reading of fixed discursive parameters in the institutions "corroborates the view that Aristotle's subdivision of the discipline into three genres was based on the observation of actual oratorical practice" (219). While the...

Aristoteles’in Poetika’sı Işığında Sofokles’in Filoktetes Tragedyası

Aristoteles etik, estetik ve politika üzerine olan görüşlerinin yanında “Poetika” isimli eserinde tragedya karakterlerinin özgür iradeleri, ahlaki değerleri ve eylemsel tercihlerini inceleyerek bir tragedya biçimi tartışmaktadır. Antik Yunan tragedyalarının günümüz tiyatrosunun yapı taşını oluşturan eylem birliği Aristoteles’in fikirlerinde tezahür etmektedir. Aristoteles’ten neredeyse bir yüzyıl önce yaşamış, milattan önce beşinci yüzyılın en etkili tragedya yazarı olan Sofokles, Poetika’da tartışılan tragedya biçiminin karşılığını veren eserler üretmiştir. Öyle ki çağın tiyatro şenliklerinde birçok kez birincilik alması buna kanıt olarak gösterilebilir. Sofokles’in bilinen son eseri olan ve yönetmenliğini yaparak sahneye koyduğu “Filoktetes” tragedyası çeşitli otoritelerce kendisinin en iyi dokunmuş eseri olarak nitelendirilmektedir. Bu çalışmada, Aristoteles’in poetikasındaki temel kavramlar incelenecek ve Sofokles’in Filoktetes eserindeki karşılıklarının izi sürülecektir. Dolayısıyla Filoktetes’in yazgısı, iradesi ve ahlakı arasındaki diyalektik irdelenecek olup düşünsel açıdan okuyucuya katkı sunmak amaçlanmaktadır.

Athenian Honorary Decree for Aristoxenos

The document is an honorary decree in favour of Aristoxenus son of Simon from Boeotia, who is made proxenos and euergetes for having helped the Athenians. The decree, despite its fragmentary and problematic nature, is an extremely interesting document since it belongs to that small yet critical group of honorary decrees stipulating a public proclamation in the theatre during a ‘preliminary ceremony’ to the dramatic festival of the Great Dionysia. The obscure reasons for the conferred honours also provide an excellent starting point for investigating the historical contingencies in which the decree was issued.

METHODS AND TOOLS OF INFORMATION DISSEMINATION ON A DAILY BASIS IN THE ANCIENT WORLD - FROM AGORA TO ACTA DIURNA

Together with the development of civilization in world history, the need to disseminate information individually as well as collectively had progressively increased. Accordingly, each civilization tried to find a newer, faster and more efficient way of recording and transmitting information. The most important steps in this regard were taken in the ancient world. Antiquity had come a long way from sharing a piece of information on the Agora to developing an idea of writing news stories on a daily basis. Public meetings and trials on the Agora, as well as performances at special dramatic festivals, drew fairly large audiences. In the ancient world, various signaling mechanisms and the system of messengers were also used quite effectively to convey information, but the principle of disseminating everyday recorded information, reminiscent of modern media, played an important role in informing the public, preceded by the Annals and the Fasti in particular. The Annals conveyed the important events of the year, taken place in Rome, in a current-affairs style. The same practice of recording the information was also applied by the historians of the Ancient Near East, but the Romans are credited for coining the term “annals” to the very style of dispatching the historical events. The Fasti, on the other hand, were a kind of calendar and marked chronological or diachronic records of material, all kinds of interesting information from both religious or secular life. As we have already mentioned, the most effective means of rapid and mass dissemination of written information was the Acta Diurna, introduced by Julius Caesar in 59 BC, the very first year of his consulship. It was fundamentally different from the Annals and the Fasti. The Fasti were more of a calendar nature, the Annals conveyed only important information, while the Acta Diurna contained relatively insignificant news as well. Based on the arguments suggested in the current paper, we came to the conclusion that the idea of today’s newspaper was formed in antiquity, developed and implemented in the form of daily written news, which formed the basis of the epoch-making aspiration for freedom of speech. Accordingly, it can be assumed that in the paper, for the first time in classical philology, we have illustrated the way of logical development that ultimately led the ancient world to moving from the Agora type of democratic sharing of information to the practice of creating and disseminating daily news.

Crowns, Garlands, and Ribbons for Tony Podlecki: Official and Unofficial Victory Rituals at the Athenian Dionysian Festivals

The competitive spirit has long been singled out as a distinctive feature of ancient Greek civilization. The external and public orientation of consciousness and identity is another. It is not surprising, therefore, that scholarship has taken a keen interest in the rituals of public recognition for athletic victories. Surprisingly little attention, however, has been directed to victory rituals for musical and dramatic competitions. Scholars are content to guess that victory rituals for choral and dramatic victors were much the same as for athletic victors even in the case of the relatively well-attested Athenian dramatic festivals. No one has yet collected and sifted through all the evidence. In doing so, I hope to clarify common misconceptions about the time and place at which both official and unofficial rituals for theatrical victories in classical Athens took place. Specifically, I will demonstrate that the official crowning of victors in the theatre was followed (probably immediately as the victor moved to celebrate the epinikia in the main precinct of the Sanctuary of Dionysus) by three of the rituals also attested for athletes: the carrying of the winners on their friends’ shoulders ( periagermos); the showering of the victors with flowers and garlands ( phyllobolia); and the tying of ribbons on the victors’ heads, arms, and legs ( tainiosis).

Pericles’ Decree Censoring Comedy

The claim that Pericles in 440 sponsored a decree restraining comedy because of the genre’s offensiveness should be rejected. The claim depends on the scholium to Ar. Ach. 67; this paper argues that the alleged decree was the scholiast’s deduction from a victor list that showed three non-performance years in a festival. These are better explained as a suspension in only one of the two dramatic festivals, occasioned not by hostility to freedom of speech but perhaps by limited resources caused by the siege of Samos.

Scenes of Cold War Diplomacy: Romania and the International Theatre Institute, 1956–1969

The article maps Romania’s involvement with the International Theatre Institute during its first decade of membership. The argument revolves around a number of East–West convergence high points such as the 1959 Helsinki Congress or the 1964 Bucharest Symposium. It analyzes the connections developed by Romanian theatre specialists within the framework provided by iti, the specialized networks they helped create and the domestic impact of these interactions. The article examines the multifaceted Romanian involvement with these projects in national and international context. It begins in 1956, Romania’s first participation at the Dramatic Art Festival in Paris, the forerunner of iti’s Theatre of Nations Festival. It closes the arc of the story with the 1969 international symposium on training young theatre directors. The article shows that soon after joining iti ranks, Romanian theatre artist were propelled into the international limelight and were recognized by their Western peers. It advances the idea that East European theatre practitioners had a role in shaping their respective community of knowledge as much as their Western counterparts did.

Anthropomorphism, Theatre, Epiphany: From Herodotus to Hellenistic Historians

Abstract:This paper argues that, beginning with the Euripidean deus ex machina, dramatic festivals introduced a new standard into epiphanic rituals and experience. Through the scenic double énonciation, gods are seen by mythical heroes as gods, but by the Athenian spectators as costumed actors and fictive entities. People could scarcely believe these were ‘real’ gods, but would have no doubt been impressed by the scenic machinery. Thus the Homeric theme of a hero’s likeness to the gods developed into the Hellenistic theme of the godlike ruler’s (or actor’s) theatrical success (or deceit). So in the Athenians’ Hymn to Demetrius Poliorcetes, a victorious ruler entering a city is welcomed as a better god than the gods themselves. The simultaneous rise in popularity of paradoxical stories and experiences in the Hellenistic period was grounded not in believing, but in disbelieving – a phenomenon associated with antiquarian interests, the self-publicity of religious sanctuaries, or amazed credulity. People were increasingly drawn to ‘real’ gods, leading to long pilgrimages and extensive financial outlay (in the mysteries) in order to see them. I investigate this phenomenon by focusing upon fragments of the ‘mimetic’ or ‘tragic’ Greek historians that survive from this period.

Greek Tragedy: Lost Plays and Neglected Authors

Greek Tragedy: Lost Plays and Neglected Authors J. MICHAEL WALTON At the bottom of page 1 of The Lost Plays of Greek Tragedy, Volume 1,* Matthew Wright adds a footnote to his résumé of some of the views of early Greek tragedy before Aeschylus’ Persians. “I do not discuss the early twentieth-century ‘ritualists’—e.g. Harrison, Cornford, Murray—whose work is refuted at length by Pickard-Cambridge (1927), because I regard their theories as pure fantasy .” This is an encouraging opening if only because Greek drama is curiously prone, in generalized summaries of Athenian culture or of theatre history, to maintaining obsolete notions about anything from kothornoi to compulsory attendance at the theatre as a civic obligation. An exclusively ritual origin to the dramatic festivals is another of these that has recently re-raised its implausible head, and it is good to see it summarily dismissed. Wright continues to lay out his stall in this chapter, entitled “The Earliest Tragedies,” and to consider the possible contributions of Thespis, Choerilus, Pratinas and Phrynichus as “prototragedy.” He follows with the account of origins offered by Aristotle in the Poetics. What is missing, and is, I would suggest, a serious oversight in such a study, is any critical assessment of the importance of Homer, either in terms of subject matter or how epic may have become dramatic. Skeptical as Wright may be about approaching Greek drama from a performance perspective, there is surely room for the moment, Thespian or otherwise, when the rhapsode’s “Agamemnon spoke and said” morphs into “Enter Agamemnon.” *Matthew Wright, The Lost Plays of Greek Tragedy, Volume 1: Neglected Authors, London, Oxford, New York, New Delhi, and Sydney: Bloomsbury, 2016, 277 pages. arion 24.3 winter 2017 What follows is for the most part more persuasive. In the five chapters after this opening, Wright marshals a mass of references from the best part of a thousand years about a strong tragic tradition which lasted well into the Hellenistic period before declining from Greek into Latin. Numerous lost playwrights are identified, traced as far as maybe with a diligence that is admirable, indeed formidable. A whole chapter (chap. 3) devoted to Agathon is justified if only because more is known about him, though not his work, than about any other of these “neglected authors.” The suggestion, however, that he might somehow have influenced Oscar Wilde carries little conviction. Chapter 4 on “Tragic Family Trees” is the most intriguing . Wright takes off in a different direction here, asking interesting questions about the possibility of theatrical dynasties in Athens. But some of the questions, though asked, can produce no proper answer, at least at this point in his argument. The reason for novel approaches is surely more to do with the need for innovation in the well-trodden path of Greek myth, which Wright later emphasizes for the fourth century BCE (121), than with the agonistic nature of theatrical production (92). A couple of passing references to Harold Bloom serve only to remind us how marginal his reading of the Greeks now seems. On the other hand, the detailed tracing of Carcinus, best known as a choreographer (or a comic butt) from the finale to Aristophanes ’ Wasps, identifies first his son, then his grandson, another Carcinus, as an important figure of the fourth century stage. The trouble is, and it is something of which Wright is clearly aware, what sense can you make tracing a dramatic tradition via plays that are not there? And none of them are. Most of the tragedians whose existence is recognized from fragments, quotations or didascaliae are at best ghostly presences represented, if they are lucky, by the odd speech of twenty or so lines without a context. And with dramatic dialogue context is everything. greek tragedy: lost plays and neglected authors 160 Imagine, for example, if nothing was left from Euripides’ Medea but the following: Oh, Jason, I’m sorry. Forgive me For what I said. I was angry . . . “What a fool you are, Medea,” I tell myself “To get upset with those who want to help . . .” (869–74) Even if aware of Euripides’ other work, might we not imagine from such lines in...

The Dramatic Festival Inscriptions of Athens: The Inscribers and Phases of Inscribing

The Dramatic Festival Inscriptions of Athens: The Inscribers and Phases of Inscribing

Inscriptional Records for the Dramatic Festivals in Athens: IG II2 2318–2325 and Related Texts by Benjamin W. Millis, S. Douglas Olson (review)

Reviewed by: Inscriptional Records for the Dramatic Festivals in Athens: IG II2 2318–2325 and Related Texts by Benjamin W. Millis, S. Douglas Olson Jeffrey Rusten Benjamin W. Millis and S. Douglas Olson. Inscriptional Records for the Dramatic Festivals in Athens: IG II2 2318–2325 and Related Texts. Brill’s Studies in Greek and Roman Epigraphy. Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2012. Pp. xiv, 238. $163.00. ISBN 978–90–04–22912–9. This invaluable volume performs a major service for literary historians by making available an authoritative, comprehensive, detailed, and accessible edition of the remains of the most important inscriptions containing Athenian theatrical records, especially the so-called Fasti (each year’s winners), Didascaliae (each year’s entrants by finish), and Victors’ lists (each poet’s and actor’s total victories in either festival). This writer can testify how difficult it has been to study [End Page 414] these texts from the brilliant but long-outdated work of Wilhelm and Capps; the inaccurate appendix of the second edition of Pickard-Cambridge’s Dramatic Festivals; or the ill-organized, cramped, and overloaded edition of Mette. This edition is above all based on close study of the stones themselves, which are described in detail and illustrated with forty-five clear photographs. The arguments for reconstructing the length of the full text and the placement of individual fragments are set forth elegantly; for the Fasti the authors refine the calculation of Capps to reconstruct eight columns of 141 lines each. They argue that the Didascaliae must have comprised seventy columns of text with approximately 130 lines each (60). Particularly impressive is the reconstruction of IG II2 2323, where it is clear that in some years there was no comic competition, and thus just a single line of text instead of between twelve and fifteen—but how many times and in which years (76–86)? Yet a major aim has also been clarity, and these calculations are presented first in general, then in detail, then in summary, and each fragment is followed by separate epigraphic and then prosopographic (that is, literary and historical) commentary. The large-format pages allow complex texts to be reproduced with much accompanying information, and there are well-executed full-page diagrams of reconstructions on pages 26 and 92. In the process of discussing these texts the authors make important new arguments, some of which will doubtless prove controversial: Their examination (59) of the types of stone refutes the attractive hypothesis of Reisch that the Didascaliae and Victors’ lists decorated a single building dedicated ca. 280 BCE. Millis and Olson accept (133) that the latter did in fact constitute a smaller structure dedicated then, although rectilinear rather than a hexagon as Reisch proposed. They assume (76) that the phrase οὐκ ἐγένετο does not mean that the Dionysia or the competitions in general were not held, but rather that just the comedy or tragedy competition was omitted, probably in alternation (although not a regular one). They argue (123–24) that later revivals of tragedy, comedy, and satyr play must have been exhibitions of single plays rather than competitions (despite the verb ἐνίκα applied to their actors, which they explain as a previous competition on the model of a statement in [Plut.] Lycurgus), since otherwise one or more days would have had to be added to the schedule. For completeness’ sake, the so-called “Roman Fasti,” a catalogue of each poet’s record by festival and placement, is printed (without autopsy) and discussed in an appendix. This edition will be indispensable to any scholar of Greek theatre history. Since the indices are limited to the names in the texts of the inscriptions, a promised digital version will be particularly valuable. Jeffrey Rusten Cornell University Copyright © 2014 The Classical Association of the Atlantic States, Inc

POETS AND POETRY IN LATER GREEK COMEDY

The comic dramatists of the fifth centuryb.c.were notable for their preoccupation with poetics – that is, their frequent references to their own poetry and that of others, their overt interest in the Athenian dramatic festivals and their adjudication, their penchant for parody and pastiche, and their habit of self-conscious reflection on the nature of good and bad poetry. I have already explored these matters at some length, in my study of the relationship between comedy and literary criticism in the period before Plato and Aristotle. This article continues the story into the fourth century and beyond, examining the presence and function of poetical and literary-critical discourse in what is normally called ‘middle’ and ‘new’ comedy.

Dancing the Virtues, Becoming Virtuous: Procedural Memory and Ethical Presence

This paper is an exploration of the performance of Greek drama from the perspective of the performers, more specifically, of the chorus-in-training. The notion that khoreia constitutes an essential part of paideia and ethical instruction is an ancient one. And the notion persists, though in different forms, among scholars of the social and political context of these dramatic performances that to have participated in a chorus was in particular ways to have received training in essential perspectives and experiences of citizens: ‘the events and characters portrayed in tragedy are meant to be contemplated as lessons by young citizens.’ And yet what the members of a chorus were expected to learn, did learn, and, moreover, how they learned, have remained largely unexplored topics.I will suggest ways that we might begin to piece together a baseline of experiences and impressions that come through learning to sing, dance and compete in dramatic festivals. Most of the experiences that I will describe are partly functions of universal properties of the human mind; of course, culture and thoughts and other aspects of shared and individual experience are highly variable. Indeed, the contents of thought are unrestricted. But there are regular, even fixed, ways in which the mind and brain appear to work. I propose to describe an approach to the ways in which the words and movements and environment of dramatic competition are universally present to and apprehended by the senses and minds and bodies of a chorus-in-training. I am not suggesting that there are not other aspects of experience that are important to the performance and appreciation of drama. Rather, I hope to establish at the very least those aspects of training and performance that are necessary and perhaps even sufficient to bring a drama (and I take the chorus to be the most important part of drama) to the arena of competition. I will consider some of the lasting effects of dramatic training and performance on the life of the performer, i.e., how every performer may be changed by his experience.

The Birth of comedy: texts, documents, and art from Athenian comic competitions, 486-280

Aside from the well-known plays of Aristophanes, many of the comedies of ancient Greece are known only through fragments and references written in Greek. Now a group of distinguished scholars brings these nearly lost works to modern readers with lively English translations of the surviving texts. The Birth of Comedy brings together a wealth of information on the first three generations of Western comedy. The translations, presented in chronological order, are based on the universally praised scholarly edition in Greek, Poetae Comici Graeci, by R. Kassel and C. A. Austin. Additional chapters contain translations of texts relating to comedy at dramatic festivals, staging, audience, and ancient writers on comedy. The main text is supplemented by an introduction assessing the fragments' contributions to the political, social, and theatrical history of classical Athens and more than forty illustrations of comic scenes, costumes, and masks. A glossary of komoidoumenoi-the ancient word for people mentioned in comedies-provides background information on the most notorious comic victims. A full index includes not only authors, play titles, and persons mentioned, but themes from the whole Greek comic sphere (including politics, literature and philosophy, celebrities and social scandals, cookery and wine, sex, and wealth).

Comic Business: Theatricality, DramaticTechnique, and Performance Contexts of Aristophanic Comedy (review)

Reviewed by: Comic Business: Theatricality, DramaticTechnique, and Performance Contexts of Aristophanic Comedy Froma Zeitlin Martin Revermann . Comic Business: Theatricality, Dramatic Technique, and Performance Contexts of Aristophanic Comedy. Oxford University Press. xii, 396. US $115.00 The brilliance of Aristophanic comedy has never been in dispute. Zany plots, wicked satire, political invective, and shocking obscenity mix with flights of soaring lyric and imaginative schemes that refigure reality and gleefully subvert everyday conventions of decorum in the service of Dionysiac freedom – at least for the brief time of the dramatic festivals in Athens. Revermann's lively and informative study of this greatest of comic poets makes us keenly aware that a script is only the first step in any theatrical production, and nowhere more so than in the case of the competitive environment in this democratic city, where poets are rivals and success depends on the management of every type of theatrical technique: costumes, props, stage machinery, configuration of stage movement, and visual signs (to name only a few). Drawing on the methodologies and conceptualizations of Theatre Studies, as this field has evolved over the last years, Revermann's objective was to 'pin down, analyse, and contextualize the professionality, the rationale, the logic, the manipulative elements behind what, at first sight, seems to be theatre of almost bewildering anarchy and confusing, if tantalising, absurdism.' In the process, he offers an invaluable introduction to this theatrical approach with specific reference to Greek drama (tragedy included). In no way, however, does he neglect the textual and philological aspects of more conventional readings; he confronts head-on such tricky problems as the 'authenticity' of a given theatrical script in the light of re-performance of plays in the late fifth century, and the vexed question of Aristophanes as a typical representative of the comic genre altogether. After a section in which Revermann applies performance criticism to the examination of such elements as space, proxemics (the study of gesture and physical interaction), the characteristics of comic 'ugliness' in costumes and masks, and the relations between a performance and its audience, he turns to three case studies for closer analysis. Two of these are well known: the Clouds (that lampoons Socrates and his so-called school, the Thinkery), and Lysistrata, the favourite of anti-war movements in staging a women's strike for peace ('make love, not war'). [End Page 212] The third, Wealth (or Ploutos) is a late comedy that turns on the economics of desire and poses a different set of problems to the interpreter regarding its apparent anomalies. Several appendices on specific issues round out the book. No one could doubt the valuable service that Revermann has rendered to the study of the ancient theatre. Every page shines with some previously unconsidered insights as, for example, variations in the role and significance of the doorkeeper (who controls entrances and exits) or the visual functions of the carriers, who bring on the numerous props on which the comic business often depends. Revermann's painstaking efforts to decipher the stage machinery needed to hoist Socrates in the air or to resolve the question of Lysistrata's possible historical identity are only a few of the issues that meet with judicious examination. At the same time, Revermann refreshingly acknowledges the limitations of his approach, which is to compile 'the set of theatrical codes, conventions, contexts, and practices which can be reconstructed from the textual and archaeological remains of the period.' While the principles are sound, much must remain speculative, he admits, given either the scarcity or ambiguity of the evidence. One could go further: does the application of the technical apparatus of performative criticism add a layer of interpretation to reach results that could be attained by other, more conventional, means? Or more explicitly, do Revermann's readings in his case studies substantially alter our received ideas about these plays? The answer is no, to some degree, but as for a heightened awareness of the numerous details, large and small, that are necessary to make a play into a living event, the answer is a resounding yes. For the value of this study lies not only in learning to recognize the value-laden components of the theatrical...

"Rara coronato plausere theatra Menandro?" Menander's success in his lifetime

There is a widespread impression that Menander was not successful as a dramatist in his lifetime. A number of ancie t authors point out that Menander's merits were not appreciated by his contemporaries and his plays only rarely met with success in the theatre (Manil. 5, 475; Mart. 5,10, 9; Quint. 3,7,18; Gell. 17, 4, 6); elsewhere we hear that Philemon, though in ferior to Menander as a playwright, found greater favour with the audience of the time and beat Menander in several competitions (Quint. 10,1,72; Gell. 17, 4,1-2; Apul. Flor. 16, p. 24 Helm). This information is usually accepted as historical fact and the image of Menander as a genius unappreciated by his contemporaries has become almost standard in modern scholarship.2 But is this image true? It is striking that the authors presenting it (Manilius, Martial, Gellius, Quintilian, Apuleius) are much later than Menander and Philemon: they all belong to the imperial age and, incidentally, are all Latin. Gellius (17, 4, 4-6) draws his information about Menander's career from Apollodoros' Chroni cle (2nd c. B.C.), possibly via an intermediate source, and seems to attribute to Apollodoros a remark about the paucity of Menander's victories (17,4,6): ex istis tarnen centum et quinqu? omnibus solis eum octo vicisse idem Apollodorus eodem in libro scripsit. But it seems doubtful that the qualification solis here is derived from Apollodoros. Apollodoros presumably limited himself to recording the number of Menander's victories at Athenian dramatic festi vals. We may form an impression of Apollodoros' manner of recording such facts from passages of other authors drawing from his Chronicle, like

Celebrating poetic victory: representations of epinikia in Classical Athens

Abstract:Although we are fairly well informed about the general organization and important events of the dramatic competitions in Athens, there remain significant gaps in our knowledge on many points of detail. In no place is this more true than with regard to the epinikian celebration honouring members of the victorious performance, about which scarcely any unambiguous testimony has come down to us. This study aims to provide new insights into the problem by demonstrating a connection between the iconography preserved in several sculpted reliefs of the Roman period commonly referred to as Dionysos' visit to Ikarios and the representation of a celebration for poetic victory in Plato'sSymposium. Central to the combined testimony of these sources is the ideal of Dionysos’ epiphany to the poet in order to acknowledge and honour his victory in person. So identified as an element of victory celebration, related articulations of this imagined moment can then be detected in several additional representations on vases and in Aristophanic comedy, in both of which other independent elements likewise suggest the activation of an epinikian syntax. Practical matters about the celebration still elude us; what we gain, however, is a clearer sense of the religious ideals that were conveyed through these celebrations in connection with the worship of Dionysos, which formed a nucleus for the dramatic festivals.

Aristophanes and the Carnival of Genres by Charles Platter

8 2 I N T E R T E X T S W o r k s C i t e d Gevirtz, Karen Bloom. Life After Death: Widows and the English Novel, Defoe to Austen. Newark: UDelaware P, 2005. Guest, Harriet: Small Change: Women, Learning, and Patriotism, 1750-1810. Chicago: UChicago P, 2000. Joyce, James. Ulysses. Ed. Hans Walter Gabler. New York: Vintage Books, 1984. Shoemaker, Bob. Gender in English Society, 1650-1850. The Emergence of Separate Spheres! London: Longman, 1998. Vickery, Amanda. “Golden Age to Separate Spheres? AReview of the Categories and Chronology of English Women’s History.” The Historical Journal 56.2 (June 1993): 3 8 3 - 4 1 4 . J e n n i f e r S n e a d Texas Tech University Platter, Charles. Aristophanes and the Carnival of Genres. Bdtimore: Johns Hopkins UP, 2007. x+272 pp. In an article published in 1993, Charles Platter threw down the gauntlet: “I think Bakhtin seriously underrates the complexity of Aristophanes” (209-10). InAristophanes and the Carnival of Genres, Platter backs up his claim by showing the rewards of readingAristophanes through aBakhtinian lens. In each chapter, Platter spins out innovative readings of select scenes; taken as awhole, his book offers an important contribution to classics’ ongoing incorporation of Bakhtin whose catchphrases, such as carnivalesque and dialogism, are now becoming common fare in some areas of classical scholarship. Platter’s text will be of central interest to anyone wanting to ven¬ ture into the complexities of Aristophanic language as well as for those seeking innovative methodologies that can be exported into studies of other authors or genres. The application of Bakhtinian ideas to Aristophanes is neither new nor straightforward. Since the late 1960s, when Julia fcisteva brought Bakhtin’s work to center stage in literary studies, numerous classical scholars have tried their hand at applying Bakhtin to Aristophanes. But such aproject places the Aristophanes scholar in atricky bind. On the one hand, Bakhtin’s theories of carnival, laughter, dialogism, and the grotesque all seem to cry out for Aristophanes. On the other hand, Aristophanes is puzzlingly absent from much of Bakhtin’s thinking on the history of laughter. The much less famous tradition of Menippean satire and the Socratic dialogue receive pride of place in Bakhtin’s formulation. The Sirens’ song of recasting Aristophanic comedy as Bakhtinian carnival, then, can all too easily make us forget the dangerous pitfalls of such an undertaking. The main impediment to connecting Aristophanes and Bakhtin derives from classical Athenian drama’s role as part of state-sponsored festivals. This institutionalized starting point for Aristophanic laughter clashes with 8 3 R e v i e w s Bakhtin’s theory of carnival: “[Carnival laughter] always remained afree weapon in [the people’s] hands” {Rabelais 94). This means that any simple equation of Aristophanic comedy with Bakhtinian carnival quickly confronts the reality that Old Comedy simply was not apopular, organic, bottom-up, antihierarchical event that those at the top of the social power structure grudgingly tolerated. Thus, anyone wanting to apply Bakhtin to Aristophanes must carefully consider how to proceed. Can we understand the Dionysiac festivals of Athens (both the City Dionysia and the Lenaia) asexamplesofcarnivaldespitethefactthattheywererunbythepolishOr we can we see the Athenian democracy as agovernment rooted in the same popular currents as carnival (though such aposition would call into question the very concept of acarnival festival)? Or is there some other wayoutofthisapparentbind?TheclosestthatPlattercomestoanswering these questions inAristophanes and the Carnival of Genres is the comment that “[e]ven what appears to be comedy’s overall aristocratic bias becomes intelligible in carnival terms as the attempt by the polls to institutionalize carnival laughter and so limit the disruptive and destabilizing forms that carnival laughter could take” (2). WecangainadeeperunderstandingofPlatter’sstanceonthisissueby dipping into his earlier articles (Platter 1993 and 2001). Here he fully admitsthechallengesofapplyingBakhtinto Aristophanesandarguesthat wecanmakeprogressbyrecognizingtwopointsaboutBakhtin’stheones. First,ideasaboutcarnivalasahistorical,sociologicalrealitycanbeseparated from the idea of carnival literature, which can exist without any correspon¬ ding festive event. Thus, while the Athenian dramatic festivals might not count as aform of carnival,Aristophanic comedy can still exhibit traits of carnivalesqueliterature(thoughBakhtinhimselfmighthavedenigratedsuch literatureashaving“aprivate‘chamber’character,”Rabelais,37).Andsec¬ ond,BakhtinunderestimatedthecomplexityofAristophanicdramaasatis¬ sue of intertextual voices that fits well into Bakhtin’s...

Civic ideology and the problem of difference: the politics of Aeschylean tragedy, once again

There have been few issues in the contemporary analysis of Greek tragedy as hotly debated as what I shall call ‘civic ideology and the problem of difference’. By this I mean a nexus of interrelated questions concerning the political import of tragedy both for the fifth-century Athenians and for subsequent generations: how does the festival of the Great Dionysia—its rituals and dramatic performances—relate to the dominant ideological structures of democracy? How should critical or contestatory discourse be located within the dramatic festival and within the polis? How should the texts of tragedy be related to the society in which they were produced—and to the societies in which they are still being read and performed? The problem is not merely essential to our understanding of the genre of tragedy, but is also intimately connected to the history and theory of democracy and its discontents. To what degree can democracy respond to criticism and what space can it allow, in theory and in practice, for alternative viewpoints or opposition? In its most aggressive form, such questioning of the exclusions and repressions of democracy is sometimes articulated as a challenge as to whether the costs of (ancient) democracy outweigh its benefits.

The Greek and Roman Stage

This text sets out to bring to life the Greek and Roman plays and their staging, evoking the visual and emotional character of performances and dramatic festivals and offering a clear account of the plays and their writers. It attempts to re-create the excitement of the competitions and analyses the practical challenges faced by the playwrights and actors in staging the plays, whether tragedies or comedies. It also aims to bring to life the costumes, masks, stage and scenery, as well as the audience's reactions to the experience. book gives clear summaries of well-known Greek and Roman plays and their authors, and explores in depth some of the best-known, particularly Antigone and The Clouds. There are many suggestions for further study, including additional reading for both the teachers and pupils, topics for discussion, subjects to write about, and activities for individuals and groups.