greek theatre ALL critics

‘for there are in the play not one Oedipus but two’

Knox on the duality of Oedipus

‘Oedipus seeks out knowledge beyond the scope of what is prudent or necessary’

Waggoner on Oedipus’ extensive quest for knowledge

‘indescribable, unspeakable, inexpressible’

Holderlin on Oedipus’ suffering

‘his arrogance, leading to hubristic behaviour and his horrible temper’

Wyles on Oedipus’ hamartia

‘his knowledge is what makes him tyrannos, confident and decisive’

Knox on Oedipus’ knowledge giving him power

‘in the hero’s name the basic equation is already present, the equation which Oedipus will finally solve’

Knox on ‘oida’

‘no chance … that this [marriage to someone as old as his mother] could have passed unnoticed’

Lesser on Oedipus’ marriage to Jocasta

‘He killed Laius by free choice, thereby abdicating any claim to essential moral innocence’

Griffith on Oedipus’ moral innocence

‘the oracle impels Oedipus to an inquiry into his own past, which will reveal how the course of his life has been the working-out of the gods’ curse’

Silberman on the outcome of Oedipus’ investigation into his own life

‘Oedipus’ fate is shown to be the direct result of his actions’

Silberman on the consequences of Oedipus’ freewill

‘an impersonal force, not an Olympian deity or even a lackey of the gods like the Furies, and it is as binding upon gods as upon morals’

Griffith on fate’s omnipotence

‘submission to the divine will and realisation of his own impotence’

Freud on what the play teaches

‘No poet speaks more than Sophocles of the need for reverence’

Kitto on Sophocles’ pious teachings

the play testifies to a ‘desperate insecurity of human condition’ in a ‘world of appearance which hides from us who-knows-what dreadful reality’

E.R. Dodds on the deep insecurity of human existence and hidden reality

Oedipus is ‘accursed, wilful, inquisitive, courageous, inspiring’

Rush Rehm describes Oedipus in 5 words

‘there is no meaning in ‘Oedipus Rex’; there is merely the terror of coincidence’

A.J.A  Waldock on the lack of deeper meaning in OTK

‘we keep to the law. This is because it commands our deep respect’

Pericles on the importance of the law

‘the worst thing is to rush into action before the consequences have been properly debated’

Pericles on the importance of debate

‘ignorance is the curse of god’

Shakespeare on ignorance

‘‘through suffering a man learns to be modest before the gods’

Bowra on the central idea of a Sophoclean tragedy

‘symbol of human intelligence which cannot rest until it has solved all the riddles’

Dodds on Oedipus as a riddle-solver

‘the craving for poetic drama is permanent in human nature’

T.S Elliot on the human craving for dramatic literature

‘of all men Oedipus should have succeeded’

Cedric Whitman on Oedipus’ apparent destiny for success

‘immoral work’

how Freud refers to the play

‘the ambiguity of what he says does not reflect a duplicity in his character, which is perfectly consistent, but more profoundly, the duality of his being’

Vernant and Vidal-Naquet on the complexity of Oedipus’ being

‘his tragic flaw forces the audience to fear for him… and his horrific punishment elicits a great sense of pity from the audience’

Professor Peter T. Struck on Aristotle’s tragic hero

‘Oedipus’s culpability… what we would now call recklessness - consciously proceeding in the face of a substantial and unjustifiable risk’

O’ Hear on Oedipus’ recklessness

‘although Oedipus is by far the greatest sufferer in the play, he is not the only one’

Kitto on suffering in OTK

‘inexorable destiny guiding men to ruin’

Kitto on the effects of destiny

'ruling passion’

Pope on power

Oedipus’ ‘initial tendency to discharge his aggressive impulses on someone else’

Faber on Oedipus’ temper

‘proud and overconfident’ 

Barstow’s 2 word description of Oedipus

‘a man of action, swift and vigorous action’

Bloom on Oedipus and action

‘what causes his ruin is his own strength and courage his loyalty to Thebes, and his loyalty to the truth.’

Dodds on Oedipus’ loyalties as the cause of his ruin

Oedipus ‘acting freely, who brought on the catastrophe, not gods, not fate’

Gould puts the blame solely on Oedipus

‘wisdom [...] is an abomination’

Nietzsche on the main message of the play

‘the epitome of Athenian values’

what Knox thinks Oedipus is the epitome of

Creon is ‘marked by strong self-respect and is essentially kindhearted’ in ‘Oedipus the King’ but is ‘the heartless and hypocritical villain (in Colonus and Antigone)’

Professor Richard Jebb on Creon in OTK, and in Colonus and Antigone

‘I contradict myself, I am vast I contain multitudes’

Walt Whitman on contradiction

‘I know that I know nothing’

Socrates on ignorance

‘One is the magnificent figure set before us in the opening scenes, tyrannos, the man of wealth and power, first of men, the intellect and energy which drive on the search. The other is the object of the search, a shadowy figure who has violated the most fundamental human taboos an incestuous parricide, ‘most accursed of men’

Knox’s description of the 2 different Oedipi

Dionysus is ‘the director of the play’

Easterling on Dionysus’ metatheatrical role

'the ultimate nightmare’

Griffin on the reversal of female nature

‘scholars have frequently observed that Dionysus is a god who beats down barriers (of gender, class, social norms)

Goggin on Dionysus and stereotypes

‘punishments of mortals by gods is extravagant and undiscriminating’

Dover on mortal punishment

‘his unshakeable and increasingly sinister calm’

Griffin on Dionysus’ creepy calmness

‘will be the key to his undoing’

Griffin on Pentheus’ obsession with his sexual fantasies

‘Pentheus is destroyed by his repressed desires and contradictions’

Griffin on the reasons for Pentheus’ destruction

'Neither completely good nor completely bad, he has enough of the positive in him to arouse our sympathy when he is torn to pieces.’

Roisman on sympathy for Pentheus

Pentheus has the 'sexual curiosity of a Peeping Tom'

Dodd on Pentheus’ perverse tendencies

'an inhuman tormentor’

Winnington-Ingram’s description of Dionysus

‘carried magical, profiteering and sexually promiscuous connotations as well as a damning appeal to women and people of a low social status’

Goggin on the influence of foreign religions

'The appearance of Pentheus cross-dressed and with Bacchic accessories offers a visual representation of Dionysus' full control over him’

Wyles on Pentheus in drag

‘vindictive, cruel and unjust’

Dover’s 3 words to describe Dionysus

'Pentheus, the sensible defender of rational order, is drawn to a wretched end; irrationalism rises against enlightenment'

Walter Burkert’s sympathetic view of Pentheus

‘That the women of a city should sever all their domestic ties and behave without restraint as if they were part of the natural world is profoundly shocking to a Greek world’.

Dover on the response of the Greek world to Bacchic women

‘if anyone despises divinity let them look on this man’s death and believe in the gods!’

Dover on a conversion to piety

‘Maenads do not simply defy gender roles, they upend the normative paradigm that restricts women to domesticity and threatens chaos to the polis’

Goggin on the subversive, corrupting nature of the Maenads

‘basically peaceful and friendly women become violent killers under the gods’ influence’

Holzhausen on the impact of gods on women

‘the chorus’ madness is the ‘positive ritual experience of identification with the gods’ whereas the madness of the Theban women is a ‘painful affliction’

Goggin (quoting Cole) on the difference between the chorus of Bacchants and the Theban women

‘the punishment for refusing to worship the god consists paradoxically in the enforced practise of the cult’

Holzhausen on the inescapable nature of the Bacchic rites

‘the destruction of the royal family is, no matter how pitiable, no disaster for Thebes’

Barry on the impact of the destruction of the royal family in Thebes

‘validating religious and political order, the theatre is designed to teach civic virtue’

Burian on the purpose of tragedy

‘the punishment which Pentheus suffers is frightful’

Dover on the unfairness of Pentheus’ punishment

‘her realisation of what she has done casts her into the depths of misery’

Dover on Agave’s realisation

‘Myths exemplify the anxieties people feel about family relationships’

 Griffin on what myths do

‘a warning to anyone who rejects the claims of divinity’

Dover on Cadmus’s punishment

‘the most striking paradox (of the play) is that the god who throughout the play promises joy will at the end produce only suffering and horror’

Garvie on the paradox of Dionysus’ promises and actions

‘the political question that emerges most insistently in this play is whom to trust’

Affleck and Letchford on the question that emerges most in the play

‘we can infer Athenian attitudes to tragedy’

Dover on what we can infer from Frogs

‘lowers the tone’

Campbell on what Dionysus does in Frogs

‘a rejection of the new lifestyle, a return to the old moral centre’

Redfield on what the victory of Aeschylus represents

‘Aristophanes both tests new parameters of Old Comedy and strengthens existing ones’

Habash on what Aristophanes does with parameters of Old Comedy

‘it’s mixture of slapstick, nonsense and more serious political, cultural and moral insights, has proved a perennial favourite’

Affleck and Letchford on why Frogs has been a perennial favourite

‘Soldiers and politicians are viciously vilified as anyone’

Jones on which groups are targeted for insult in Frogs

‘old-fashioned Aeschylus…modern, sophistic Euripides’

Affleck and Letchford’s description of Aeschylus and Euripides

‘Aeschylus and Euripides are presented as caricatures of what their art represented in the minds of the audience’

Bakola on what Aeschylus and Euripides are caricatures of

‘Aeschylus only deals with noble things… natural inspiration’ 

Bakola on what Aeschylus deals with

‘the poet of clever craft…subversive’

Bakola’s description of Euripides

‘not literary criticism but political action‘

Bettendorf on the primary function of the play

‘connected with the democratic institutions of Athens’ 

Platter on what Aristophanic comedy is connected with

‘to make a point about the… necessity of approaching the serious through the comic‘

Hubbard on how and why Aristophanes structured Frogs

Dionysus is ‘Sometimes acting the fool and always foolish’

 Rosemary Harriott on Dionysus and foolishness

Frogs was ‘written and produced at a time of extreme uncertainty’

Affleck and Letchford on the situation at the time Frogs was written

‘vehicles for the expression of serious political views’

de Ste Croix on the purpose of Aristophanes’ plays

‘punishment of mortals by gods is extravagant and undiscriminating’

Dover on the immortal’s punishments

‘the will to power’

Nietzsche on power

tragedy presents men as ‘better than in actual life’

Aristotle on how tragedy presents men

‘pity is evoked by unmerited misfortune, fear by the misfortune of a man like ourselves’

 Aristotle on what pity is evoked by

‘Power corrupts. Absolute power corrupts absolutely’ 

Lord Acton on power

‘As flies to wanton boys are we to the’ gods. They kill us for their sport’

Shakespeare, King Lear on the cruelty of the gods

‘civilised life demands period release, reversal , even explosion’

Dover on what civilised life demands, and what comedy gives

‘empowerment of the little man’

Dover on who comedy empowers

‘the humour of excretion belongs to all cultures’

Dover on scatological humour

‘comedy is not an effective medium for political intervention’

Jones on what comedy is not an effective medium for

‘to grumble and slander’

Dover on the business of comedy

political satire is the ‘hallmark of Old Comedy’.

Compton on the hallmark of Old Comedy

the chorus ‘express the moral and religious lessons to be drawn’

Dover on what the chorus express

‘to purge and give meaning to human suffering’

Fagles on the function of great art

‘an exercise in propaganda’

what Carey calls the drama festivals