Continue with The Oresteia -- how
the major themes set up
in Agamemnon,
(issues of justice, blood guilt, and conflicting
moral duties) are
continued
through Libation Bearers,
and finally resolved in Eumenides.
1. The context of Eumenides as a response to a specific set of political reforms
enacted
four years
before The Oresteia was
produced, and precisely
what kind of response the trilogy represents to these reforms.
2. The way in which the gender issues
raised in Agamemnon are resolved
by Eumenides.
Topic Nine - A Master of Spectacle
Aeschylus's stagecraft in The Oresteia.
1. Use of the skene building, especially in Agamemnon,
with the entrance of Agamemnon and Cassandra on
chariots;
2. The famous "tapestry" scene in which Agamemnon walks into his palace
on crimson cloth;
3. The probable use of the ekkyklema to display the bodies of the dead
in Agamemnon
and Libation Bearers;
4. The Furies in Eumenides .Topic Ten - The Three Electra
plays.
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The Electra plays of the two other great tragedians, Sophocles
and
Euripides.
Comparing the treatment of
Electra's and Orestes's vengeance
against Clytemnestra and Aegisthus with the treatment of the
same
theme in Libation
Bearers.
Topic Eleven - The Sophoclean Hero
Sophocles, the second great tragedian;
1. Summarize what we know about his life,
2. His possible contributions
to stagecraft;
3. Examine common idea that Sophocles's heroes are notable
for their extreme isolation.
Topic Twelve - Antigone and Creon
Antigone, one of Sophocles's most famous plays.
Topic Thirteen - Oedipus the
King I
Part One of the discussion of Oedipus the King.
1. Summary of the mythic background of the Oedipus
story;
2. How Sophocles used this story in his great play;
3. Several important themes.
Topic
Fourteen - Oedipus the King, II
Part Two of the discussion of Oedipus the King.
a. Examine three influential readings of the play:
1. Aristotle's discussion in Poetics of how tragedy
works
and the characteristics of the tragic "hero"; and its application
to Oedipus.
2. Freud's interpretation and why, despite its enormous
influence,
this theory sheds little light on the play.
3. then, another common
reading of the play that focuses on
the conflict between fate and free will.
b. Finally, the implications of Sophism for our understanding
of Oedipus.
Topic Fifteen - Two Tragedians, One Hero To Top of this
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Two plays: Sophocles’ Women of Trachis and Euripides’s Heracles,
that take the greatest hero of Greek myth, Heracles, as their subject.
Topic
Sixteen - Greek Husband, Foreign Wife
One of Euripides's most famous tragedies, Medea.
1. The mythic background and plot of the tragedy;
2. An
examination of the various dimensions of Medea's
and Jason's characters;
3. A consideration of the implications of
Medea's status as a foreigner
for our understanding of the tragedy;
4. What the tragedy implies about Athenian views of sexuality
and reproduction.
Topic
Seventeen - Phaedra, Hippolytus, and Aphrodite's Wrath
Another by Euripides, Hippolytus, in which issues of gender,
sexuality,
and reproduction are again in the foreground.
1. The relevant background and the story of Theseus;
2. An examination of Euripides's treatment of the incestuous passion
of Theseus's
wife Phaedra, for her stepson, Hippolytus.
3. The way Euripides inverts the normal story to shift blame
from Phaedra to Hippolytus and the goddess Aphrodite.
4. The implications of Hippolytus for ourunderstanding of Athenian
attitudes toward sexuality.
Topic
Eighteen - Euripides on War and Women
1.
Two of Euripides’ tragedies (Hecuba and Trojan Women)
vividly present portraits of the damage caused to civilians,
particularly to women, by
war.
2.
Sketch of the Peloponnesian War, which was going on when these plays
were performed.
3. Euripides's treatment of the conquered women of Troy and the possible
implications of his choice of Greece's mythical
enemies, the Trojans,
as subjects of these tragedies.
Topic
Nineteen - Euripides the Anti-Tragedian To Top of this
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Two of Euripides's least "tragic" tragedies: Iphigenia
in Tauris
and Orestes.
1. Written near the end of both the Peloponnesian War and
Euripides's life, these
plays differ greatly in tone, but resemble
one another in their reversal of many
standard aspects of tragedy.
2. Summary of each play and why each is "anti-tragic"
and
what the implications of this "anti-tragedy" may be.
Topic
Twenty - The Last Plays of Euripides
Euripides's last two plays, both performed posthumously
(as part of the same trilogy), Iphigenia at Aulis and Bacchae.
(The emphasis here is on Bacchae).
1. Brief look at Iphigenia at
Aulis, Euripides's
last treatment of the
House of Atreus theme, and a discussion of how the
modifications
he makes to the traditional story differ from his earlier treatments.
2. Then, the Bacchae, the only Greek tragedy to
feature Dionysus
as a main character.
a. Several of the play's major themes, including: the emphasis
on the worship of
Dionysus as a form of madness;
b. The resistance of the main character, Pentheus, to the god's power;
c. The terrible price that Pentheus pays for his lack of belief.
Topic
Twenty-One - Euripides and the Gods
The final discussion of Euripides turns to one of the most vexing critical
questions
about this tragedian: what was his attitude toward the traditional
gods
of Greek culture?
Topic
Twenty-Two - The Last Plays of Sophocles To Top of this
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Back to Sophocles (who died a few months after Euripides)
for his
two last plays, Philoctetes and Oedipus at Colonus.
1. A detailed summary of the plot of Philoctetes, then
the implications
of its portrayal of Odysseus. Examine the "happy" ending
of the play and some of the points it leaves unresolved.
2. Sophocles's last play, Oedipus at Colonus, focusing
on
Oedipus's role as a guardian hero in Colonus.
3. The portrait of Athens painted in Oedipus at
Colonus
and its relationship to the state of the polis in 406,
the year
in which Sophocles wrote the play.
Topic Twenty-Three - Other Tragedians and a Comedian
1. Two tragedies of uncertain origin, one famous and one obscure.
2. Some reflections of tragedy in Athenian comedy.
Topic
Twenty-Four - The Tragic Legacy
1. The later history and continued influence of Greek
tragedy.
2. The revivals of the plays of Aeschylus, Sophocles, and
Euripides
in the Hellenistic theatre;
3. A sketch of the modification of the
tragedians' works in the
Roman Seneca's tragedies.
Outlines
adapted from Teaching Co. lectures of E. Vandiver
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