Aristotle's Poetics

Aristotle, author of many works on many different topics.

The earliest surviving work of dramatic and literary theory, Aristotle's Poetics, examines what exactly drama and poetry are as well as what makes for a good story.  Aristotle identified six elements of tragedy (the focus of the selection in the Norton anthology):  plot, character, language, thought, spectacle and melody.  He also examines what doesn't work in plots and character development (just because it focuses on one character does not make it unified, stay away from episodic plots) and what should be done (if you have to do things that are outside of the realm of normal events, make it happen off stage).  It ends with a brief discussion on the role of the chorus and how it should behave like a normal actor instead of just being there to distract the audience.  

It's interesting to see Aristotle critique the plays and poems that I just spent two months or so reading.  It provides an extra layer of depth beyond a very shallow understanding you get if you have no idea what he's referring to.  Plus since his description critiqued and commented on actual elements of the performance of the plays, it helps with visualization.

Plato's Apology

Socrates consumes the hemlock that kills him after the events of the Apology

Plato wrote the Apology to serve either as a historical account of his teacher's defense for charges of impiety and corrupting the youth of Athens.  Long a thorn in the side of Athenians, three prominent Athenians have arranged for Socrates to face trial in hopes of his removal from the Athenian scene (by execution or by exile).  Plato divides his story into three parts, Socrates' defense, his setnencing, and his reaction to his death sentence.  Socrates lays out his case that he is not an atheist, nor has he corrupted the youth of Athens.  He does this while countering a particular accuser, Meletus, and outlining the contradiction of Meletus reasoning.    Socrates also makes his case for why he is not afraid.  Death is either an eternally long and peaceful sleep or a chance to question the dead heroes of Greek culture, both of which he looks forward to.  He is also worried only about doing good.  Eventually he is found guilty of his crime, and counters the prosecution's proposed punishment of death by asking to be set up in what is essentially a penthouse suite that is typically reserved for the victors of the Olympics.  It is no surprise that the jury is upset with his intransigence and decide to sentence Socrates to death.  He accepts his fate, reiterates that he is not afraid of death and that he has acted not out of self-preservation but only for the good, as he should have.

The most striking part of the Apology is when Socrates is describing death.  He doesn't fear it as it will either be the longest and best sleep or a chance to continue doing what he loves doing, pestering people with his questions.  It's a very strange take on death that is different from the view most have of it.  His view on the importance of doing good even in the face of death is not, and is a consistent theme of Greek literature (see Antigone, who does right by the gods even though it leads to her death).  

Whether this is an accurate tale of what transpired during Socrates' trial or not is unknown, but it doesn't alter the philosophy outlined (either as Socrates' own or Plato's in Socrates' mouth) if it was written just to discuss death and goodness.

Aristophanes' Lysistrata

The Acropolis, where the action happens, because it's hard to find appropriate images for this play.

Lysistrata, a play by Aristophanes, is a Greek comedy set during the Peloponnesian War.  It tells the tale of a Greek woman, Lysistrata, who brought  the men of the main warring parties (Athens and Greece) to their knees by organizing a sex strike by the women.  Lysistrata persuades the women of Greece to forgo sex with their men until hostilities have ended.  They also take the Acropolis, which serves as the Athenian treasury, in an end to cut of funding for the Athenian war effort.  Without money for weapons or comfort from their wives, the Athenians try to persuade Lysistrata and the women to end their efforts but Lysistrata refuses.  Sparta sends an envoy begging Lysistrata to end the sex strike, but she orders them to seek peace with the Athenians.  The Spartans and Athenians broker a peace deal (with Lysistrata admonishing both groups of delegates) and celebrate with feasting (and sex with their lovers and wives afterwards).

Despite the story of a woman taking charge in a male-dominated society and standing up to a patriarchal social structure, Lysistrata is pretty dang far from a feminist tale of gender equality.  The women are portrayed as weak-willed, foolish, and as having a voracious sexual appetite.  Lysistrata's sex strike is the worst possible thing for the women as well as the men, and we are reminded of this not only when Lysistrata reveals her plan but also at the Acropolis when she catches women escaping home. The women themselves acknowledge that they need men to keep them in line.  Lysistrata seems to be the exception rather than the rule for how Athenian women behave.

The play may not even be for acknowledging that peace is desirable over war.  Lysistrata waited years before putting her plan into action, and only after it became obvious that the war had reached a stalemate with neither side being any closer to victory, despite the losses of husbands and sons that women were giving up to the war effort.  It may be this last effect of the war that eventually drives Lysistrata to do the sex strike. Peace may not be preferred to war, but it certainly is preferred over a stale mate.

Medea

Medea, or Exhibit A in why you shouldn't trust people willing to kill their own brother.

Medea, one of the few surviving plays by Euripides focuses on the revenge its titular character takes upon her ex-husband and his trophy wife.  Jason abandons his marriage to Medea in order to marry Glauce, the princess of Corinth, out of a desire for higher standing and political power. Medea, who is suspected of magic is exiled by King Creon.  She gets an extension of one day to put her affairs in order.  The King of Athens visits with Medea and distraught by her situation offers Medea protection from all who would seek to harm her.  With protection in place, Medea hatches a plan to seek her revenge against Jason, Glauce and King Creon.  She sends a poisoned and enchanted robe and diadem as a wedding gift to Glauce.  When Glauce puts them on she is killed, as is her father who comes into contact with the poison while grieving.  Upon hearing this news Medea kills hers and Jason's children.  Jason rushes to Medea to find out what she has done and to punish her for her crimes, but too late as Medea has taken off in the chariot of Helios for Athens taunting Jason that she has taken away his future family with Glauce and his family with her.

Medea is an character.  You want to sympathize with her for much of the play.  She is a woman betrayed by the one constant in her life in a society where that was socially acceptable and justified.  But she takes her plans for revenge one step too far (or many steps too far really).  In the end you can't accept what she has done, it's just too much to bear.  Even if the world she finds herself is arrayed against her because of her gender or identity as a non-Grecian (a barbarian), that hardly justifies the murders she commits.  She's a villain first, but she's an explained villain which makes it go down just a little easier.

Antigone

Antigone tries, unsuccessfully, to persuade her sister Ismene to commit civil disobedience.

Antigone details the end of three of Oedipus' four children.  His sons Eteocles and Polynices fought in single combat over the rule of Thebes, and neither survived.  Eteocles, as the champion of Thebes, was given a "state" burial, but Polynices (who raised an army against Thebes) was to be denied any sort of rite by order of the new king of Thebes, Creon.  Antigone, distraught at Creon's order,  buried him anyway with a thin layer of dust.  Creon has him exhumed and his body re-exposed.  Antigone buries him again, but is caught this time.  Creon sentences her to spend the rest of her life walled in a cave.  Creon is eventually persuaded to let her out by the Chorus under threat of the gods wrath.  He arrives too late, Antigone has hung herself.  Creon's son and Antigone's fiance, Haimon, kills himself upon seeing Antigone dead.  Creon's wife upon hearing the news of her son's death, commits suicide and Creon ends the play regretting everything.

Antigone's an important work of Grecian political philosophy, even if that was not its purpose.  Creon argues for a very strong view of the state, one in which the king literally is the state.  To disobey his orders are to disrespect him, but to harm the very fabric of society.  He takes Antigone's disobedience as an attack against the state and brands her a traitor.  In the end, Sophocles makes it very clear this is not the most virtuous way of running a state.  That the state's leaders are held to a higher power, the rules set forth by the gods.

Antigone also establishes another theory of relations between the citizen and the state, that a citizen can be justified in purposefully flaunting the state's rules when the rules conflict with a higher standard.  Sophocles telling makes it clear that Antigone was doing what is right by ignoring Creon's order.  She was a hero to the citizens of Thebes (even if she was a rather tragic one) because she upheld a much higher standard than that of Creon.

Oedipus The King

Oedipus says goodbye to his daughters, Antigone and Ismene.

Oedipus is a painful play to read.  Not that it's poorly written or tedious or written in dense prose, but that it is a the proverbial train wreck you can't look away from (I'm going to stop saying "It's like a train wreck you can't look away from" and replace it with "It's like Oedipus The King").  That was the part of the point, the story of Oedipus was more well known to the Greeks than it is to us today (or Sigmund Freud).  Sophocles wanted his audience to mess with his audience, and he certainly succeeded.

Oedpius The King is the story of the fall of Oedpius.  Oedipus is the king of Thebes after he solved the Sphinx's riddle and the death of Thebe's previous king.  Thebes is under a new curse, attributed to the unsolved death of the previous king.  Oedipus promises to hunt the murderer down and banish the killer from Thebes.  Creon, Oedipus's right-hand man, brings a prophet who accuses Oedipus of killing the previous king.  Oedipus sends the prophet away in a fit of rage and a messenger from the court of Corinth arrives to inform Oedipus that his foster father has died.  His wife take the conversation with the Corinthian and figures out who killed the previous king.  Oedipus wife realizes that Oedipus has not only killed the previous king, but that he is the son she sent away after she delivered him.  She encourages Oedipus to stop his pursuit of the killer, but he refuses so she retreats to the castle.  Oedipus then questions a shepherd who was the only surviving member of the king's entourage when the king was murdered.  It is revealed that Oedipus is the murderer of the previous king, who was also his father and that his current wife is his birth mother.  His wife/mother has killed herself after realizing what has happened and Oedipus blinds and exiles himself in his despair over his wife/mother and his fate.

Like I said, this is painful to read because you know how it will end.  But you can't stop reading because you know it's going to end in disaster (and not just because it's a tragedy, but because of Oedipus's hubris which is a classic Greek theme).  The story is tragic, but it seeks to demonstrate you can't escape the fate the gods have set before you.  If you are destined to kill your father and sleep with your mother.  Your parents abandoning you to die on a hillside or fleeing from your supposed parents isn't going to stop you from fathering two sons (who will kill each other by the end of the trilogy) and two daughters (one of which will have killed herself by the end of the trilogy) who also happen to be your brothers and sisters.

The Oresteia

The Furies, the Greek spirits of vengeance and punishment.

The Oresteia is a trilogy of plays consisting of Agamemnon, The Libation Bearers and The Eumenides.  These three plays are among the first plays in the Western tradition and are among seven of the surviving plays by Aeschylus.  It is a sequel to the Illiad, telling the story of Agamemnon's death at the hands of his wife (Clytamenestra) and her lover (Aegisthus), the death of  Clytamenestra and Aegisthus at the hands of Orestes and of Orestes's trial in Athens for his crime against his mother.  The trilogy serves as a origin story for Athens as a seat of justice and the end of an older form of justice, revenge killings.  

Clytamenestra has set up a series of signal lights so that she can be informed of the Greek victory in Troy.  With this knowledge she gets her trap ready for her husband back home.  When Agamemnon returns, he unloads his slave, Cassandra, and is greeted by the crowds which decline to inform Agamemnon of his wife's trap.  Agamemnon returns to his castle while Cassandra prophesies her upcoming death.  Cassandra enters the castle and is killed along with Agamemnon.  Clytamenestra then goes back out among the crowds and announces what she has done.  Her's and Agamemnon's son, Orestes, returns home and learns of his father's death at the hand's of Clytamenestra.  He then kills Clytamenestra and Aegisthus.  Upon spilling his mother's blood, Orestes is pursued by the Furies (Greek spirits of vengeance who seek out criminals especially those who harm their mothers).  Apollo, serving as Orestes's guardian, persuades the Furies to go to Athens and for Athena and a jury of Athenians to try Orestes for murder.  The Furies begrudgingly agree.  Orestes is found innocent (but only with a divine vote) and Athens establishes its home as a source of a new justice.  The Furies are enraged and believe that their loss in Athens will spell the end of a fear of retribution and a wave of crime.  The gods involved do not agree and save a spot for the Furies in the new order of justice.

The Oresteia is an important reminder that literature is more than just stories.  The Oresteia was written by an Athenian, performed by Athenians, for an Athenian audience.  It serves to praise Athens as the source of enlightenment.  Athens is above the traditional justice that plagues much of the rest of the world.  It alone serves as a source of new justice based on fairness, evidence, and trial by jury.  It serves to remind Athens of the clear break they have made with the past tradition.  It is a story of national egoism and patriotism.  While well written and dealing with important ethical issues, this should be remembered.