Scott McGill
- Published in print:
- 2005
- Published Online:
- September 2007
- ISBN:
- 9780195175646
- eISBN:
- 9780199789337
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195175646.003.0002
- Subject:
- Classical Studies, Poetry and Poets: Classical, Early, and Medieval
This chapter examines the (probably) earliest extant full-length Virgilian cento, Hosidius Geta's Medea, which takes the form of a tragedy. The aim is to explore how Geta accomplishes the feat of ...
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This chapter examines the (probably) earliest extant full-length Virgilian cento, Hosidius Geta's Medea, which takes the form of a tragedy. The aim is to explore how Geta accomplishes the feat of turning Virgil's verses into a tragic poem, and to approach that subject through the lens of genre, as well as of allusion. Focus lies upon interpreting the formal and thematic adaptation of Virgil to a drama on Medea, the use of Virgilian lines to allude to Ovidian and Senecan tragedy, and the intertextual relationship between the cento and Virgil's Aeneid 4, the story of Dido.Less
This chapter examines the (probably) earliest extant full-length Virgilian cento, Hosidius Geta's Medea, which takes the form of a tragedy. The aim is to explore how Geta accomplishes the feat of turning Virgil's verses into a tragic poem, and to approach that subject through the lens of genre, as well as of allusion. Focus lies upon interpreting the formal and thematic adaptation of Virgil to a drama on Medea, the use of Virgilian lines to allude to Ovidian and Senecan tragedy, and the intertextual relationship between the cento and Virgil's Aeneid 4, the story of Dido.
Isobel Hurst
- Published in print:
- 2006
- Published Online:
- September 2007
- ISBN:
- 9780199283514
- eISBN:
- 9780191712715
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199283514.003.0006
- Subject:
- Classical Studies, Literary Studies: Classical, Early, and Medieval
This chapter examines the use of Greek heroines such as Medea, Antigone, and Alcestis, and historical figures like Xantippe and Aspasia, to explore feminist issues in the work of George Eliot, Eliza ...
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This chapter examines the use of Greek heroines such as Medea, Antigone, and Alcestis, and historical figures like Xantippe and Aspasia, to explore feminist issues in the work of George Eliot, Eliza Lynn Linton, Augusta Webster, and Amy Levy. In translations, dramatic monologues and novels, ancient heroines could speak eloquently of the wrongs of women in a way which resonated with Victorian readers. Characters from the tragedies of Sophocles and Euripides, especially Medea, the vengeful victim whose motivation for killing her rival and her own children could be cast in terms of a rebellion against patriarchal society, and Alcestis, the wife who gives up her life for an ungrateful husband, allowed these writers to explore women's anger and violence in a safely distanced context.Less
This chapter examines the use of Greek heroines such as Medea, Antigone, and Alcestis, and historical figures like Xantippe and Aspasia, to explore feminist issues in the work of George Eliot, Eliza Lynn Linton, Augusta Webster, and Amy Levy. In translations, dramatic monologues and novels, ancient heroines could speak eloquently of the wrongs of women in a way which resonated with Victorian readers. Characters from the tragedies of Sophocles and Euripides, especially Medea, the vengeful victim whose motivation for killing her rival and her own children could be cast in terms of a rebellion against patriarchal society, and Alcestis, the wife who gives up her life for an ungrateful husband, allowed these writers to explore women's anger and violence in a safely distanced context.
Elliot Kendall
- Published in print:
- 2008
- Published Online:
- September 2008
- ISBN:
- 9780199542642
- eISBN:
- 9780191715419
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199542642.003.0006
- Subject:
- Literature, Early and Medieval Literature
This chapter turns to the exemplary narratives of Confessio Amantis and examines their household-based economics of power through the theme of the exchange of women. Interpretations of Gower's tales ...
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This chapter turns to the exemplary narratives of Confessio Amantis and examines their household-based economics of power through the theme of the exchange of women. Interpretations of Gower's tales are contextualized by discussion of the politics of aristocratic marriage in the late 14th century. The representation of lordship and female will is considered in relation to various challenges to a ‘reciprocalist’ traffic in women, including female independence, rape, and incest. The chapter argues that Gower's tales sponsor a reciprocalist model of marriage exchange that is apparently non-coercive but securely governed by household, seigneurial interests. There are extended treatments of the tales of Rosiphelee, Jason and Medea, Apollonius of Tyre, Jephte's Daughter, and Alboin and Rosemund.Less
This chapter turns to the exemplary narratives of Confessio Amantis and examines their household-based economics of power through the theme of the exchange of women. Interpretations of Gower's tales are contextualized by discussion of the politics of aristocratic marriage in the late 14th century. The representation of lordship and female will is considered in relation to various challenges to a ‘reciprocalist’ traffic in women, including female independence, rape, and incest. The chapter argues that Gower's tales sponsor a reciprocalist model of marriage exchange that is apparently non-coercive but securely governed by household, seigneurial interests. There are extended treatments of the tales of Rosiphelee, Jason and Medea, Apollonius of Tyre, Jephte's Daughter, and Alboin and Rosemund.
Tim Stover
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- September 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780199644087
- eISBN:
- 9780191741951
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199644087.003.0007
- Subject:
- Classical Studies, Literary Studies: Classical, Early, and Medieval, European History: BCE to 500CE
This chapter analyzes the manner in which Valerius recovers a space for heroic virtus by recuperating the figure of Jason. Valerius' recuperative strategy is read as a response not only to ...
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This chapter analyzes the manner in which Valerius recovers a space for heroic virtus by recuperating the figure of Jason. Valerius' recuperative strategy is read as a response not only to Apollonius' controversial depiction of Jason, but also as a timely reaction to Lucan's iconoclastic assault on the very concept of heroic ‘excellence’. Valerius' reintroduction of the aristeia, a device undermined by Lucan's portrayal of anonymously inglorious warfare, is an important element of his restorative program. Since Valerius' rehabilitation of Jason relies heavily on his interactions with Medea, the chapter examines how her presence allows Valerius to advertise his rehabilitative gestures vis-à-vis the issues of epic virtus and Jason's heroism. It is argued that Valerius' recuperative strategy marks the narrative — and historical — present as a time conducive to bona fide heroics, a situation made possible by the Argonautic moment ushered in by Vespasian's accession to power.Less
This chapter analyzes the manner in which Valerius recovers a space for heroic virtus by recuperating the figure of Jason. Valerius' recuperative strategy is read as a response not only to Apollonius' controversial depiction of Jason, but also as a timely reaction to Lucan's iconoclastic assault on the very concept of heroic ‘excellence’. Valerius' reintroduction of the aristeia, a device undermined by Lucan's portrayal of anonymously inglorious warfare, is an important element of his restorative program. Since Valerius' rehabilitation of Jason relies heavily on his interactions with Medea, the chapter examines how her presence allows Valerius to advertise his rehabilitative gestures vis-à-vis the issues of epic virtus and Jason's heroism. It is argued that Valerius' recuperative strategy marks the narrative — and historical — present as a time conducive to bona fide heroics, a situation made possible by the Argonautic moment ushered in by Vespasian's accession to power.
John Kerrigan
- Published in print:
- 1997
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198184515
- eISBN:
- 9780191674280
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198184515.003.0013
- Subject:
- Literature, European Literature, Film, Media, and Cultural Studies
Medea is examined once again, described as intelligent, beautiful, honorable, yet jealous and spiteful. She is the perfect example of a woman scorned yet she does not simply ignore it. She defines ...
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Medea is examined once again, described as intelligent, beautiful, honorable, yet jealous and spiteful. She is the perfect example of a woman scorned yet she does not simply ignore it. She defines the rage and strength of a woman, traits that were once suppressed and muted. Though first unseen by authors, Medea became a symbol of feminism that carried on for years in drama. Criminologists have stated that a number of crimes were attributed to women, implicating that women are not simply the weaker sex. More often than not, it is her broken and damaged relationship with her partner that provoked her to violent acts, an anger that cannot be silenced. A more important trigger was her parental instincts, as she would risk her own life for the sake of her children.Less
Medea is examined once again, described as intelligent, beautiful, honorable, yet jealous and spiteful. She is the perfect example of a woman scorned yet she does not simply ignore it. She defines the rage and strength of a woman, traits that were once suppressed and muted. Though first unseen by authors, Medea became a symbol of feminism that carried on for years in drama. Criminologists have stated that a number of crimes were attributed to women, implicating that women are not simply the weaker sex. More often than not, it is her broken and damaged relationship with her partner that provoked her to violent acts, an anger that cannot be silenced. A more important trigger was her parental instincts, as she would risk her own life for the sake of her children.
John Kerrigan
- Published in print:
- 1997
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198184515
- eISBN:
- 9780191674280
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198184515.003.0004
- Subject:
- Literature, European Literature, Film, Media, and Cultural Studies
The chapter now turns on the Greek mythical figure Medea, one who was abandoned by Jason and was left with two sons. In many twists of the tale she was one who was insanely jealous of Jason's lady ...
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The chapter now turns on the Greek mythical figure Medea, one who was abandoned by Jason and was left with two sons. In many twists of the tale she was one who was insanely jealous of Jason's lady pursuits, sending poisonous robes to her rivals and even killing her own children to strike revenge. Jealously is a dangerous emotion that obscures logic and seeks violence. But she is also seen as one that was betrayed, one that was left waiting alone to care for her children. Her honor had been disgraced, and to some this justifies her revenge. But murder is not without punishment, and in one account, Medea kills herself. Her story is one of the most tragic stories in Greek mythology.Less
The chapter now turns on the Greek mythical figure Medea, one who was abandoned by Jason and was left with two sons. In many twists of the tale she was one who was insanely jealous of Jason's lady pursuits, sending poisonous robes to her rivals and even killing her own children to strike revenge. Jealously is a dangerous emotion that obscures logic and seeks violence. But she is also seen as one that was betrayed, one that was left waiting alone to care for her children. Her honor had been disgraced, and to some this justifies her revenge. But murder is not without punishment, and in one account, Medea kills herself. Her story is one of the most tragic stories in Greek mythology.
C. A. J. Littlewood
- Published in print:
- 2004
- Published Online:
- January 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780199267613
- eISBN:
- 9780191708350
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199267613.003.0002
- Subject:
- Classical Studies, Plays and Playwrights: Classical, Early, and Medieval
This chapter discusses the ambiguities of self-representation in a world of moral and physical disorder. Particularly in the bare paradoxes exchanged as sententiae it becomes difficult to distinguish ...
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This chapter discusses the ambiguities of self-representation in a world of moral and physical disorder. Particularly in the bare paradoxes exchanged as sententiae it becomes difficult to distinguish the polar opposites of vice and virtue, the inhuman alienation of the maniac from the autonomy of the Stoic sage. Seneca's distinctively artificial style — his presentation of reality and fate as mere constructions — poses distinctive moral challenges for his characters. There are discussions of Medea's knowledge of her own myth, Lycus' statement (in Hercules Furens) that the victors write the histories, and the intervention of the second chorus in Troades which dismisses the reality of Achilles' ghost as empty words, and a play like a bad dream.Less
This chapter discusses the ambiguities of self-representation in a world of moral and physical disorder. Particularly in the bare paradoxes exchanged as sententiae it becomes difficult to distinguish the polar opposites of vice and virtue, the inhuman alienation of the maniac from the autonomy of the Stoic sage. Seneca's distinctively artificial style — his presentation of reality and fate as mere constructions — poses distinctive moral challenges for his characters. There are discussions of Medea's knowledge of her own myth, Lycus' statement (in Hercules Furens) that the victors write the histories, and the intervention of the second chorus in Troades which dismisses the reality of Achilles' ghost as empty words, and a play like a bad dream.
William G. Thalmann
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- September 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780199731572
- eISBN:
- 9780199896752
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199731572.003.0005
- Subject:
- Classical Studies, World History: BCE to 500CE
The farther east the Argonauts progress along the south coast of the Black Sea, the more tenuous becomes the poem’s ability to define space in Greek terms. In Colchis, the goal of their journey, they ...
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The farther east the Argonauts progress along the south coast of the Black Sea, the more tenuous becomes the poem’s ability to define space in Greek terms. In Colchis, the goal of their journey, they confront a space that a different culture has produced, over which they have no control. The story of Medea falling in love with Jason and helping him win the Golden Fleece is set within this alien space. It could be read as the triumph of Greek skill over uncultured “barbarians,” but many elements in the poem go against this. The Colchians have their own culture, which is both like that of the Greeks and radically different. Aietes is portrayed as both civilized and savage; these two sides of his character are reflected in the arrangement of Colchian space. Medea herself is both vulnerable girl who prizes the Greek values of female shame and dangerous witch. According to Herodotus the Colchians were descended from Egyptians, and the Argonauts’ experience among them may parallel Greeks’ experience of cultural contact in Egypt. The Colchian narrative is also analyzed in regard to the significance of various places and the way this is established by movements into and out of them in a way characteristic of human spatial production.Less
The farther east the Argonauts progress along the south coast of the Black Sea, the more tenuous becomes the poem’s ability to define space in Greek terms. In Colchis, the goal of their journey, they confront a space that a different culture has produced, over which they have no control. The story of Medea falling in love with Jason and helping him win the Golden Fleece is set within this alien space. It could be read as the triumph of Greek skill over uncultured “barbarians,” but many elements in the poem go against this. The Colchians have their own culture, which is both like that of the Greeks and radically different. Aietes is portrayed as both civilized and savage; these two sides of his character are reflected in the arrangement of Colchian space. Medea herself is both vulnerable girl who prizes the Greek values of female shame and dangerous witch. According to Herodotus the Colchians were descended from Egyptians, and the Argonauts’ experience among them may parallel Greeks’ experience of cultural contact in Egypt. The Colchian narrative is also analyzed in regard to the significance of various places and the way this is established by movements into and out of them in a way characteristic of human spatial production.
Fiona Macintosh
- Published in print:
- 2019
- Published Online:
- September 2019
- ISBN:
- 9780197266519
- eISBN:
- 9780191884238
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- British Academy
- DOI:
- 10.5871/bacad/9780197266519.003.0010
- Subject:
- Literature, Poetry
Tony Harrison is widely acclaimed for his ability to make the most complex arguments lucid and accessible. Yet it is this very accessibility that often belies the degree of scholarship that informs ...
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Tony Harrison is widely acclaimed for his ability to make the most complex arguments lucid and accessible. Yet it is this very accessibility that often belies the degree of scholarship that informs his work for the theatre, in particular. It is not just that his versions of ancient Greek plays are underpinned by solid classical learning; it is also that they involve a considerable amount of scholarly research in libraries. To bear witness to this scholar-poet's scrupulous attention to detailed scholarship, this chapter takes as case-study an overlooked text from Harrison’s corpus, Medea, A Sex-War Opera(1985). This work was commissioned by New York’s Metropolitan Opera House as a libretto for a score by Jakob Druckman that was never completed. Indeed, Harrison’s libretto has never properly seen the light of day: the only (albeit truncated) production to date - the 1991 Medea: Sex Warby The Volcano Theatre Company - interwove Valerie Solanis’ 1960’s radical feminist text, The S.C.U.M. Manifesto (Society for Cutting Up Men) into the Harrison libretto.
Yet Medea, A Sex-War Opera is an ingenious, witty and hard-hitting piece of social intervention that still speaks powerfully back to, and vociferously against, twenty-first century gender discrimination. Ranging from George Buchanan’s Latin version (c.1540s) to Robert Brough’s demotic mid-Victorian burlesque (1856), the libretto is testament to Harrison’s extraordinary wide reading from ancient to modern versions of Medea’s story.Less
Tony Harrison is widely acclaimed for his ability to make the most complex arguments lucid and accessible. Yet it is this very accessibility that often belies the degree of scholarship that informs his work for the theatre, in particular. It is not just that his versions of ancient Greek plays are underpinned by solid classical learning; it is also that they involve a considerable amount of scholarly research in libraries. To bear witness to this scholar-poet's scrupulous attention to detailed scholarship, this chapter takes as case-study an overlooked text from Harrison’s corpus, Medea, A Sex-War Opera(1985). This work was commissioned by New York’s Metropolitan Opera House as a libretto for a score by Jakob Druckman that was never completed. Indeed, Harrison’s libretto has never properly seen the light of day: the only (albeit truncated) production to date - the 1991 Medea: Sex Warby The Volcano Theatre Company - interwove Valerie Solanis’ 1960’s radical feminist text, The S.C.U.M. Manifesto (Society for Cutting Up Men) into the Harrison libretto.
Yet Medea, A Sex-War Opera is an ingenious, witty and hard-hitting piece of social intervention that still speaks powerfully back to, and vociferously against, twenty-first century gender discrimination. Ranging from George Buchanan’s Latin version (c.1540s) to Robert Brough’s demotic mid-Victorian burlesque (1856), the libretto is testament to Harrison’s extraordinary wide reading from ancient to modern versions of Medea’s story.
Margaret Malamud
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- September 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780199574674
- eISBN:
- 9780191728723
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199574674.003.0010
- Subject:
- Classical Studies, European History: BCE to 500CE
This chapter considers which models from antiquity seemed most appropriate to the understanding of the momentous arguments framed (and violently contested) in antebellum America from the 1830s to the ...
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This chapter considers which models from antiquity seemed most appropriate to the understanding of the momentous arguments framed (and violently contested) in antebellum America from the 1830s to the Civil War. How and why African Americans mobilized knowledge of classical texts and antiquity in their fight for liberty and equality, and how, along with abolitionists, they legitimated, debated, and contested their political and cultural identity through references to Greek and Roman antiquity, is demonstrated. Those who the ancients saw as ethnically other 'barbarians', the Abolitionists found inspirational: the Carthaginians resistance to Rome, and Medea's defiance of Jason, for example. At the same time proslavery advocates, pointing to the ancient world’s reliance on slavery, also quarried antiquity, particularly Aristotle’s writings, in support of their position, while Herodotus and the texts related to the Roman Republican heroes were used with equal passion by polemicists on both side of the slavery debate.Less
This chapter considers which models from antiquity seemed most appropriate to the understanding of the momentous arguments framed (and violently contested) in antebellum America from the 1830s to the Civil War. How and why African Americans mobilized knowledge of classical texts and antiquity in their fight for liberty and equality, and how, along with abolitionists, they legitimated, debated, and contested their political and cultural identity through references to Greek and Roman antiquity, is demonstrated. Those who the ancients saw as ethnically other 'barbarians', the Abolitionists found inspirational: the Carthaginians resistance to Rome, and Medea's defiance of Jason, for example. At the same time proslavery advocates, pointing to the ancient world’s reliance on slavery, also quarried antiquity, particularly Aristotle’s writings, in support of their position, while Herodotus and the texts related to the Roman Republican heroes were used with equal passion by polemicists on both side of the slavery debate.
Jenny March
- Published in print:
- 2000
- Published Online:
- March 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780748614066
- eISBN:
- 9780748651054
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9780748614066.003.0008
- Subject:
- Classical Studies, Literary Studies: Classical, Early, and Medieval
This chapter examines ancient literature and art, and how they, taken together, can help throw light on tragedies in Greece, both lost and extant. It considers child murder, beginning with Euripides' ...
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This chapter examines ancient literature and art, and how they, taken together, can help throw light on tragedies in Greece, both lost and extant. It considers child murder, beginning with Euripides' Medea, and then focuses on the myth of Tereus, Procne and Philomela. The chapter shows how word and image, looked at in tandem, can help to throw light, in this case, on Sophocles' lost tragedy Tereus. This is the myth of the nightingale, the very image of grief in so much of Greek poetry, who laments the death of Itys forever. Children are killed in several of the Greek myths, and the infanticide par excellence is, of course, Medea.Less
This chapter examines ancient literature and art, and how they, taken together, can help throw light on tragedies in Greece, both lost and extant. It considers child murder, beginning with Euripides' Medea, and then focuses on the myth of Tereus, Procne and Philomela. The chapter shows how word and image, looked at in tandem, can help to throw light, in this case, on Sophocles' lost tragedy Tereus. This is the myth of the nightingale, the very image of grief in so much of Greek poetry, who laments the death of Itys forever. Children are killed in several of the Greek myths, and the infanticide par excellence is, of course, Medea.
Barbara B. Heyman
- Published in print:
- 1994
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780195090581
- eISBN:
- 9780199853090
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195090581.003.0011
- Subject:
- Music, History, American
After the war Samuel Barber was discharged from the United States army. His compositions were continuously loved by its patrons as well as critics, and he was awarded once more, this time the Fifth ...
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After the war Samuel Barber was discharged from the United States army. His compositions were continuously loved by its patrons as well as critics, and he was awarded once more, this time the Fifth Annual Award of the Music Critics Circle of New York. He continued to trailblaze his way into music history, with his Cello Concerto dubbed as one of the most challenging contemporary cello compositions. This chapter describes his most “American work”: Knoxville: Summer of 1915. He was reputed to be one of the most promising American composers of his time. Barber even took an interest in ballet, for which he produced the piece Medea. This was however, dampened by the news of his father's deteriorating health and the stress it placed in Barber's mother.Less
After the war Samuel Barber was discharged from the United States army. His compositions were continuously loved by its patrons as well as critics, and he was awarded once more, this time the Fifth Annual Award of the Music Critics Circle of New York. He continued to trailblaze his way into music history, with his Cello Concerto dubbed as one of the most challenging contemporary cello compositions. This chapter describes his most “American work”: Knoxville: Summer of 1915. He was reputed to be one of the most promising American composers of his time. Barber even took an interest in ballet, for which he produced the piece Medea. This was however, dampened by the news of his father's deteriorating health and the stress it placed in Barber's mother.
Nancy Demand
- Published in print:
- 2003
- Published Online:
- March 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780748613199
- eISBN:
- 9780748651016
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9780748613199.003.0013
- Subject:
- Classical Studies, European History: BCE to 500CE
One of the messages of the Thesmophoria was that the continuity of the polis depended upon the cycle of female life: after risking death in childbirth themselves, women must soon give up their ...
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One of the messages of the Thesmophoria was that the continuity of the polis depended upon the cycle of female life: after risking death in childbirth themselves, women must soon give up their daughters to a similar fate. Euripides' Medea and female characters in the comedies of Aristophanes complain about the lack of appreciation for their contribution of sons to the polis. In ancient Greece, there were tombstones commemorating men who died in battle. If the Greeks did equate death in childbirth with death in battle, we should be able to see similar iconographical signs on monuments for both types of deaths. This is not to deny that the Greeks saw a sort of similarity between these two types of deaths. But the funerary monuments locate this similarity in the Greek grid according to age and gender, making it iconographically clear that the women who are memorialised are passive and worthy of pity, whereas the men are active and heroic.Less
One of the messages of the Thesmophoria was that the continuity of the polis depended upon the cycle of female life: after risking death in childbirth themselves, women must soon give up their daughters to a similar fate. Euripides' Medea and female characters in the comedies of Aristophanes complain about the lack of appreciation for their contribution of sons to the polis. In ancient Greece, there were tombstones commemorating men who died in battle. If the Greeks did equate death in childbirth with death in battle, we should be able to see similar iconographical signs on monuments for both types of deaths. This is not to deny that the Greeks saw a sort of similarity between these two types of deaths. But the funerary monuments locate this similarity in the Greek grid according to age and gender, making it iconographically clear that the women who are memorialised are passive and worthy of pity, whereas the men are active and heroic.
Jan Machielsen
- Published in print:
- 2015
- Published Online:
- September 2015
- ISBN:
- 9780197265802
- eISBN:
- 9780191772009
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- British Academy
- DOI:
- 10.5871/bacad/9780197265802.003.0008
- Subject:
- History, European Early Modern History
This chapter moves beyond Martin Delrio’s emendations to study his wide-ranging commentary on other aspects of classical culture. Senecan tragedy, and in particular the Medea and the Oedipus, offered ...
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This chapter moves beyond Martin Delrio’s emendations to study his wide-ranging commentary on other aspects of classical culture. Senecan tragedy, and in particular the Medea and the Oedipus, offered the Jesuit the opportunity to discuss witchcraft and practices of divination in great detail. This chapter argues that Delrio took these tragedies to have a historical core; without some basis in history the plays would lose their moral significance. It also suggests that Delrio’s comments should be read as not only explicating individual lines, but as constructing a reading of the plays in which praise and blame were apportioned. As a result, the tragedies did not carry the same moral meaning for Delrio that they have for us today.Less
This chapter moves beyond Martin Delrio’s emendations to study his wide-ranging commentary on other aspects of classical culture. Senecan tragedy, and in particular the Medea and the Oedipus, offered the Jesuit the opportunity to discuss witchcraft and practices of divination in great detail. This chapter argues that Delrio took these tragedies to have a historical core; without some basis in history the plays would lose their moral significance. It also suggests that Delrio’s comments should be read as not only explicating individual lines, but as constructing a reading of the plays in which praise and blame were apportioned. As a result, the tragedies did not carry the same moral meaning for Delrio that they have for us today.
Pietro Pucci
- Published in print:
- 2016
- Published Online:
- August 2016
- ISBN:
- 9781501700613
- eISBN:
- 9781501704055
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Cornell University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7591/cornell/9781501700613.003.0004
- Subject:
- Classical Studies, Plays and Playwrights: Classical, Early, and Medieval
This chapter discusses some connotations of sophia, with particular emphasis on the circuitousness of the theatrical gestures and the complexity of tones that it manipulates. It begins by focusing on ...
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This chapter discusses some connotations of sophia, with particular emphasis on the circuitousness of the theatrical gestures and the complexity of tones that it manipulates. It begins by focusing on the debate between Jason and Medea over the wisdom of the former's new marriage. Medea declares that her attack on Jason will bring her some solace. She does not care any longer about Jason's prosperity: she—actually her thumos—has already decided to destroy Jason. Medea's rhetorical skill and pleasure appear as an anticipation of her full victory. This chapter considers Medea's revenge as a case of a phenomenon that has great dramatic and cultural importance in Euripides's poetics. It shows how, through the poetry of Euripides's Chorus, poetry recognizes the unfairness of poetry toward women.Less
This chapter discusses some connotations of sophia, with particular emphasis on the circuitousness of the theatrical gestures and the complexity of tones that it manipulates. It begins by focusing on the debate between Jason and Medea over the wisdom of the former's new marriage. Medea declares that her attack on Jason will bring her some solace. She does not care any longer about Jason's prosperity: she—actually her thumos—has already decided to destroy Jason. Medea's rhetorical skill and pleasure appear as an anticipation of her full victory. This chapter considers Medea's revenge as a case of a phenomenon that has great dramatic and cultural importance in Euripides's poetics. It shows how, through the poetry of Euripides's Chorus, poetry recognizes the unfairness of poetry toward women.
Frances Babbage
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- July 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780719067525
- eISBN:
- 9781781701782
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Manchester University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7228/manchester/9780719067525.003.0003
- Subject:
- Literature, Drama
This chapter discusses three plays born of second-wave feminism that examine the political potential of re-visioning myths: the monologues The Same Old Story and Medea, co-authored by Franca Rame and ...
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This chapter discusses three plays born of second-wave feminism that examine the political potential of re-visioning myths: the monologues The Same Old Story and Medea, co-authored by Franca Rame and Dario Fo (1977), and Sarah Daniels' realist drama Neaptide (1986). Yet if theatre-making is inherently political, as Julia Varley suggests, any such selection may be challenged: why these texts rather than others? First, the discussions presented here aim to facilitate analysis of the political beyond Varley's claim that theatre is already, of itself, resistant. Plays have been chosen in which engagement with political subjects is self-conscious and systematic rather than, in a sense, a coincidence of their theme. Further, these plays manifestly assume a partisan position: they are left-wing in viewpoint, voicing the concerns of those whom society makes vulnerable; they aim to expose and fight injustices, and to provoke in their audiences a heightened recognition of the necessity for social change. Yet whatever analysis such plays offer, a politics of content alone is insufficient to address questions of efficacy.Less
This chapter discusses three plays born of second-wave feminism that examine the political potential of re-visioning myths: the monologues The Same Old Story and Medea, co-authored by Franca Rame and Dario Fo (1977), and Sarah Daniels' realist drama Neaptide (1986). Yet if theatre-making is inherently political, as Julia Varley suggests, any such selection may be challenged: why these texts rather than others? First, the discussions presented here aim to facilitate analysis of the political beyond Varley's claim that theatre is already, of itself, resistant. Plays have been chosen in which engagement with political subjects is self-conscious and systematic rather than, in a sense, a coincidence of their theme. Further, these plays manifestly assume a partisan position: they are left-wing in viewpoint, voicing the concerns of those whom society makes vulnerable; they aim to expose and fight injustices, and to provoke in their audiences a heightened recognition of the necessity for social change. Yet whatever analysis such plays offer, a politics of content alone is insufficient to address questions of efficacy.
Frances Babbage
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- July 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780719067525
- eISBN:
- 9781781701782
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Manchester University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7228/manchester/9780719067525.003.0007
- Subject:
- Literature, Drama
Re-visions of myth in the contemporary theatre now assume an extraordinary range of forms and test the boundaries of performance as forcefully as they interrogate the myths themselves. Confining the ...
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Re-visions of myth in the contemporary theatre now assume an extraordinary range of forms and test the boundaries of performance as forcefully as they interrogate the myths themselves. Confining the focus of this book more or less exclusively to the work of playwrights has correspondingly meant marginalising the great quantity of activity in the field which falls outside that frame. Myth re-vision in forms other than scripted drama, staged in contexts beyond theatre venues, is by no means new – even if late twentieth- and twenty-first century developments in site-specific performance, installation, live art and more have shaped source materials in increasingly startling and unpredictable ways. In July 2005, the German writer-actress Gilla Cremer presented m.e.d.e.a., the last part in her trilogy of solo shows reflecting on continuities and ruptures in German social history through the last century. It is perhaps ironic that a re-vision of the Medea narrative, a myth widely interpreted as an attack on ‘family values’, should be so decisively structured by the sense of maternal responsibility.Less
Re-visions of myth in the contemporary theatre now assume an extraordinary range of forms and test the boundaries of performance as forcefully as they interrogate the myths themselves. Confining the focus of this book more or less exclusively to the work of playwrights has correspondingly meant marginalising the great quantity of activity in the field which falls outside that frame. Myth re-vision in forms other than scripted drama, staged in contexts beyond theatre venues, is by no means new – even if late twentieth- and twenty-first century developments in site-specific performance, installation, live art and more have shaped source materials in increasingly startling and unpredictable ways. In July 2005, the German writer-actress Gilla Cremer presented m.e.d.e.a., the last part in her trilogy of solo shows reflecting on continuities and ruptures in German social history through the last century. It is perhaps ironic that a re-vision of the Medea narrative, a myth widely interpreted as an attack on ‘family values’, should be so decisively structured by the sense of maternal responsibility.
Rachel Bowlby
- Published in print:
- 2013
- Published Online:
- September 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780199607945
- eISBN:
- 9780191760518
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199607945.003.0006
- Subject:
- Literature, European Literature
This chapter looks at some articulations of the distinctive forces and passion of parental feelings, including those that come from the loss or absence of children. It notes the relative absence of ...
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This chapter looks at some articulations of the distinctive forces and passion of parental feelings, including those that come from the loss or absence of children. It notes the relative absence of the subject of parental wishes (or fears) from Freud's writings, in spite of his drawing on Greek tragedy, where children and childlessness are common themes. Parental issues are prominent in Sophocles’ Oedipus the King, for instance, where Freud saw only the history of a child. The chapter's main focus is on how parenthood and infertility appear in Euripides’ Medea. Medea is both a murdering mother whose parental feelings are unhinged in the face of her jealousy of her husband's new woman, and—at the same time—an infallible fertility consultant.Less
This chapter looks at some articulations of the distinctive forces and passion of parental feelings, including those that come from the loss or absence of children. It notes the relative absence of the subject of parental wishes (or fears) from Freud's writings, in spite of his drawing on Greek tragedy, where children and childlessness are common themes. Parental issues are prominent in Sophocles’ Oedipus the King, for instance, where Freud saw only the history of a child. The chapter's main focus is on how parenthood and infertility appear in Euripides’ Medea. Medea is both a murdering mother whose parental feelings are unhinged in the face of her jealousy of her husband's new woman, and—at the same time—an infallible fertility consultant.
Richard Seaford
- Published in print:
- 2005
- Published Online:
- May 2014
- ISBN:
- 9780859897525
- eISBN:
- 9781781380628
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Liverpool University Press
- DOI:
- 10.5949/liverpool/9780859897525.003.0007
- Subject:
- Classical Studies, Plays and Playwrights: Classical, Early, and Medieval
The mythical Niobe was a boastful mother who was punished by Artemis and Apollo by the death of her children. This chapter attempts to contextualize a fragment from Aeschylus' fragmentary play and in ...
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The mythical Niobe was a boastful mother who was punished by Artemis and Apollo by the death of her children. This chapter attempts to contextualize a fragment from Aeschylus' fragmentary play and in so doing also informs our reading of several passages in extant tragedies, such as the Antigone and the Medea, where Niobe is also mentioned. It shows that the dual presence of death imagery and wedding imagery is evoked in these passages and explains the rationale behind the tradition of Niobe's eventual transformation into stone — an ever-weeping rock — as represented in several remarkable vase-paintings which are thought to have been directly inspired by Aeschylus' play.Less
The mythical Niobe was a boastful mother who was punished by Artemis and Apollo by the death of her children. This chapter attempts to contextualize a fragment from Aeschylus' fragmentary play and in so doing also informs our reading of several passages in extant tragedies, such as the Antigone and the Medea, where Niobe is also mentioned. It shows that the dual presence of death imagery and wedding imagery is evoked in these passages and explains the rationale behind the tradition of Niobe's eventual transformation into stone — an ever-weeping rock — as represented in several remarkable vase-paintings which are thought to have been directly inspired by Aeschylus' play.
Christopher Gill
- Published in print:
- 2005
- Published Online:
- May 2014
- ISBN:
- 9780859897525
- eISBN:
- 9781781380628
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Liverpool University Press
- DOI:
- 10.5949/liverpool/9780859897525.003.0009
- Subject:
- Classical Studies, Plays and Playwrights: Classical, Early, and Medieval
This chapter examines connections between ancient philosophy and Greek tragic fragments. First, it considers how tragic fragments are typically cited and used by ancient thinkers in ethical ...
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This chapter examines connections between ancient philosophy and Greek tragic fragments. First, it considers how tragic fragments are typically cited and used by ancient thinkers in ethical philosophy. Second, it discusses an ancient debate about passion and self-division preserved in Galen. Although the key text in this debate is a surviving play (Euripides Medea), ancient philosophers also make suggestive comments about some tragic fragments on psychological division. Third, the chapter takes up a different aspect of the relationship between ancient philosophy and tragic fragments. It questions the view that we can make sense of the fragments of Euripides' first Hippolytus by relating them to Seneca's (surviving) Phaedra. It argues that that Seneca's picture of Phaedra' subjection to her love reflects a specifically Stoic conception of passion, and a different psychological pattern must be used to reconstruct the lost Euripidean drama.Less
This chapter examines connections between ancient philosophy and Greek tragic fragments. First, it considers how tragic fragments are typically cited and used by ancient thinkers in ethical philosophy. Second, it discusses an ancient debate about passion and self-division preserved in Galen. Although the key text in this debate is a surviving play (Euripides Medea), ancient philosophers also make suggestive comments about some tragic fragments on psychological division. Third, the chapter takes up a different aspect of the relationship between ancient philosophy and tragic fragments. It questions the view that we can make sense of the fragments of Euripides' first Hippolytus by relating them to Seneca's (surviving) Phaedra. It argues that that Seneca's picture of Phaedra' subjection to her love reflects a specifically Stoic conception of passion, and a different psychological pattern must be used to reconstruct the lost Euripidean drama.
