Hellenistic Tragedy

Texts, Translations and a Critical Survey

Agnieszka Kotlinska-Toma

• Publisher: Bloomsbury Academic
• Year: 2014
• ISBN:
  9781472524898
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: Ancient & Classical Literary Criticism
• Index: Literature

Ancient Greek tragedy is ubiquitously studied and researched, but is generally considered to have ended, as it began, in the fifth century BC. However, plays continued to be written and staged in the Greek world for centuries, enjoying a period of unprecedented popularity and changing significantly from the better known Classical drama. Hellenistic drama also heavily influenced the birth of Roman tragedy and the development of other theatrical forms and literature (including comedies, mime and Greek romance). Hellenistic Tragedy: Texts, Translations and a Critical Survey offers a comprehensive picture of tragedy and the satyr play from the fourth century BCE. The surviving fragments of this dramatic genre are presented, alongside English translations and critical analysis, as well as a survey of the main writers involved and an exploration of the genre's formation, later influence and staging.
Key features of the plays are analysed through extant texts and other evidence, including plots based on contemporary political themes, mythical subjects and Biblical themes, and features of metre and language. Practical elements of Hellenistic performance are also discussed, including those which have become the hallmarks of ancient theatre: actors' costumes of long robes, kothurnoi and high onkos -masks, the theatre building and the closed stage on the logeion. Piecing together a synthetic picture of Hellenistic tragedy and the satyr play, the volume also examines the key points of departure from earlier drama, including the mass audience, the mutual influence of Greek and Eastern traditions and the changes inside the genre which prove Hellenistic drama was an important stage in the development of the European theatre.

1

Tragedy in the Hellenistic Age – General Observations

Understanding the phenomenon of tragedy and satyr plays in the Hellenistic period requires an appreciation of the incredible popularity of theatre in this period. It appears to have been the time of this art form’s greatest flourishing, and this was thanks not only to the ubiquitous new comedy and mime. In the Classical period tragedy, comedy and satyr play were a typically Athenian form of entertainment, while in other parts of Greece other types of drama prevailed, such as Doric farce on the Peloponnesus or phlyakes in Sicily. In the Hellenistic period the situation was quite different. Attic dramatic genres dominated the theatre throughout the Greek world and together with other genres had an enormous influence on numerous types of mime. On the boards, or rather the theatre’s stone slabs, many plays were performed throughout the year, while the professionalization of stage artists gathered pace and made the production of plays more efficient.

Tragedy, that Athenian genre par excellence, became in the Hellenistic period a characteristic aspect of a widely understood culture of ‘Greekness’. The new geopolitical situation, which began as a result of Alexander’s expedition and the decade of subsequent conflicts between his successors, led to the creation of a new Greek cultural community. This community, not limiting itself exclusively to ethnic Greeks, but including all inhabitants who identified with Greek culture, created over the following decade new forms of literature, and yet also gave new meaning to the old ones. The new royals and their new, ambitious elite invested in the widespread understanding of culture, including literature, which not only served the areas that were undergoing the process of Hellenization, but also had a clear political and propagandistic function. Greek drama in particular devoted itself to this aim. The genre’s scope, influence and clarity of presentation could not be rivalled by any other literary form.1 Alongside New Comedy, tragedy and satyr drama were required to play no small role. These genres, based chiefly on mythological material, in an obvious way popularized their principal content within Greek culture. Theatre, as the most accessible and egalitarian form of mass entertainment in the period, perfectly met the needs of developing Hellenistic societies. Insofar as it is easy in the case of historical science to determine the agreed time boundaries of the period (for the Hellenistic era, it is usual to take the dates of the deaths of its eminent figures, that is Alexander the Great and Cleopatra VII), it is also difficult to mark them out in the literature. The scholar of literature preserved only in fragments is placed in an unfortunate situation, since one’s reasonable assumptions in the absence of sufficient information may be far from the actual facts. As a result, for the requirements of this book, tragedy and satyr dramas start with the performance of Agen during Alexander’s expedition. This play, in terms of both context and form and the circumstances of its performance, is significantly different from the popular classic fourth-century satyr play. The end of Hellenistic tragedy is marked by the stage works of Nicholaus of Damascus and the works of Asinius Pollio, which were written in Greek. Both apparently represent the Hellenization of the Eastern and Western elite. Their work has unfortunately not survived, but their dramatic output is certified in historical sources.

It must also be underlined that the period in question lasted more than 300 years. But it is evident that in terms of literary history this period was not uniform. Similarly to other genres, we can clearly distinguish the first decades of the third century BC, of which eminent representatives were, for example, the members of the tragic Pleiad or Moschion. In light of the fragmentary nature of the extant texts we can only say with certainty that the surviving material from this period is distinguished by its perfection of form, both stylistic and metrical, and also by the originality of its vocabulary. During this period there are also certified works on the topic of contemporary life. The development of Hellenistic tragedy in the second and first centuries BC is significantly less defined. We can, however, observe its unprecedented popularity among Greek-speaking societies, and not only these. Unfortunately the exact changes which took place across the span of these three centuries are for us indefinable. Perhaps we ought also to speak not only of changes across the passage of time, but also of the ‘geographical’ differences, since local factors certainly had an influence on the origin, content and form of tragedy.

Recently scholars have sought to prove the importance of theatrical performances, especially tragedy, in a political context by showing in which cities and under what circumstances honours and privileges were bestowed on outstanding citizens, especially in Athens.2 The inscriptional material is, however, insufficiently representative, and examination leads to various results and conclusions. A particular study of all tragic agones, during which the individual poleis proclaimed their honours, was recently undertaken by P. Ceccarelli, who shows the main differences arising from local traditions and their changes over the course of the decades.3 The proclamation of honours for citizens cannot constitute the only (though certainly it is the only measurable) criterion for the importance of tragedy in the political life of the public, or for its popularity in comparison with other forms of entertainment. Besides the possibilities of study, there is also the impact of tragedy’s content and its important role in the growth of a town’s culture to consider.

In a certain sense Hellenistic theatre was closer to contemporary mass culture than to modern theatre, for it was quite devoid of the elitist element that is so apparent in the drama performed today. But in this respect it also differed from Classical theatre, because, despite its commonness, it did define culture: Greek culture. The level of Hellenization in towns that remained in the Greek orbit after Alexander the Great’s conquests was testified to by the presence of theatre buildings. Hellenic civilization lasted as long as these theatres remained in use, and an example of this was the theatre building in Ai-Khanoum.4 The popularity of the theatre was also apparent in people’s everyday lives. Many terracotta figurines from Tanagra, Myrina and other towns and cities of the Mediterranean portray characters from dramas, chiefly the comedies and farces, but there are also terracotta tragic and satyr masks. Indeed, the theatre mask is one of the best-known decorative motifs of the age, ranging from architectural elements to decorations in private interiors and female jewellery.5 The best evidence of theatrical tastes towards the end of this age are the wall paintings from Pompeii, which express Greek art in southern Italy and its influence on Roman aesthetics. The number of frescoes and mosaics inspired by the theatre is vast, sometimes limited to the mask motif, at other times depicting scenes from the lives of artists and scenes from the actual plays. Hellenistic homes in the entire Greek oikoumene must have been adorned in a similar way, though these have not survived to our times. Normally, much more attention is paid to images associated with comedies, and yet images concerning tragedies and satyr plays are just as numerous and certainly not inferior in terms of quality. We try to match Pompeian artefacts with the comedies that we know (that is with the new comedy plays of Menander, as well as those of his Latin counterparts such as Plautus and Terence). No texts of Greek or Latin tragedies or satyr plays from this period have survived, so the characters in these paintings remain anonymous. But does that mean such plays were less popular on the stage? And on the basis of terracotta figurine statistics, is it at all possible to compare comedy with tragedy and satyr plays and thus assess public tastes? We do not know what made particular plays popular in Hellenistic times because we do not know what public tastes were like. We also do not know on what basis particular plays won competitions. This lack of knowledge prevents us from making an objective assessment of Hellenistic drama.

Returning, however, to the phenomenon of mass reception, we should consider the possible size of audiences. By comparing theatres built in the Hellenistic period, one can see that audience capacities varied from 800 in Nikaia in Epirus to 24,000 in Ephesus.6 If we assume that an average audience was 5,000 people and multiply this sum by the number of existing theatres (of which over 170 were built in this period alone), and also assume that several troupes of actors could travel from city to city with the same play, we arrive at the incredible conclusion that a popular play could, in a short space of time, reach an audience of up to a million people! Such a scale was quite unthinkable in the Classical period, and can be matched today only thanks to mass media and frequent repetitions in one season. This is an important aspect of Hellenistic drama, one which was decisive in making it so different from Classical drama.

The main criticism made of Hellenistic tragedy is that it does not resemble fifth-century drama. However, if this genre had remained faithful to the Euripidean model, it would have ceased to evolve and over the centuries become fossilized, and then we could indeed speak of its demise. But the case of Hellenistic drama is quite different. It was a time of continual changes, starting with the subjects of tragedies, then the stage on which plays were performed and finally the costumes worn by actors, all of which testified that drama was very much alive. Trying to evaluate it in comparison with the Classical period is misleading from the methodological point of view and essentially futile. We do not make such comparisons between old and new comedy and we do not depreciate the comedy of manners in relation to the works of Aristophanes. Here scholars generally accept that these were simply two different types of comedy. Why should we treat tragedy differently? How can one compare a play performed in a Classical theatre with a large Athenian chorus during a festival devoted to Dionysus to a tragedy performed on the logeion of the theatre in Priene, with actors wearing cothurni and ...

Table of contents

• Also Available From Bloomsbury
• Title
• Contents 
• Abbreviations
• List of Figures
• Preface
• 1 Tragedy in the Hellenistic Age – General Observations
• 2 Tragedians and Tragedies
• 3 Hellenistic Tragedy with Biblical Themes
• 4 The Staging of Hellenistic Tragedies
• Appendix: Hellenistic Theatres
• Bibliography
• Index of Hellenistic Tragedians
• Index of Historical Figures
• Index of Plays
• Copyright