The Three Great Tragedians -- July 6, 2020

Comment:

• the three great Greek tragedians wrote after the Greeks defeated the Persians in 480 BC
• this was during the fifty years of the Golden Age of Greece
• the three playwrights:
• looked at the "Heroic Age"
• provided a history of Greece
• developed the mythology of the Gods
• duality: the gods and the state
• moral lessons
• the three tragedians probably saw things differently; they were each of a different generation
• Aeschylus: very, very old; a true Greek patriot of the old school;
• Sophocles: middle age; comes of age at the very time Greece enjoys its Golden Age
• Euripides: a rebel? we'll see; he's a youngster; would want to make a name for himself

Aeschylus, 525 BC - 455 BC: myth and trilogy, the father of tragedy.

Single play: The Persians (472 BC)

• oldest extant play in existence
• not a trilogy and not based on myth
• battle of Salamis, 480 BC, Xerxes defeated

Trilogy: Oedipodea, only Seven Against Thebes survives;

• biggest conflict, last conflict before Trojan War 
• the three plays + a satyr play:
• Laius
• Oedipus
• Seven Against Thebes (only one of the three that survives) 
• Sphinx, a satyr play 

Trilogy/Tetralogy (presumed): the Danaid Tetralogy

• most likely one of his last plays
• three plays + a satyr play
• The Suppliants (The Suppliant Maidens) 
• The Egyptians (Aigyptioi)
• The Daughters of Danus (Danaïdes or The Danaids) -- worshipped as water-nymphs
• Amymone, a satry play

Trilogy: the Oresteia (458 BC)

• after Agamamnon returns home from the Trojan War
• the three plays+ a satyr play (all have been lost except a single line from Proteus) :
• Agamemnon
• The Libation Bearers
• The Eumenides 
• Proteus, a satyr play 

Sophocles, 497 BC - 406 BC: dispenses with the trilogy; adds a third actor. Wrote over 120 plays but only seven survived in complete form.

• Oldest play: Ajax
• Next: Antigone, written about the same time, about 440 BC
• Two Oedipus plays, bookends over 25 years: 
• Oedipus Rex -- first
• Oedipus at Colonus -- twenty-five years later
• Last play: Philoktetes (409 BC)
• Two other extant plays: 
• Women of Trachis
• Electra

Euripides, 480 BC - 406 BC: 93 plays; only 18 or 19 have survived more or less complete; represented mythical heroes as ordinary people in extraordinary circumstances.

• The Phoenician Women, history of King Eteokles, 410 BC
• two written shortly before his death
• Bacchae -- a vision
• Iphigenia at Aulis, the sacrifice, 
• Elektra -- the matricide
• Orestes --the Erinyes of conscience
• Iphigenia at Tauris -- the reconciliation
• Media -- uncontrolled passion
• Hippolytos -- sexual purism

The end of tragedy.

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